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Giselle shot her husband a most reproachful glare before turning back to her guests. “You must forgive my husband, dear. Sometimes he speaks before thinking,” she said. “We have yet to be blessed with heirs, but I am still hopeful. I am not so old that I still cannot conceive.”

Jordan was a little taken aback that she was speaking so openly about such a private subject. She opened her mouth to reply timidly but Giselle didn’t give her the chance.

“We have tried everything the physician suggested,” she said. “Standing on my head, copulating during a full moon, before my menses, after my menses. But, after sixteen years of marriage, nothing has worked thus far. What is your method, dear, if I might ask?”

Jordan was shocked. She could only stare at Giselle, dumbfounded, when suddenly laughter bubbled up from her lips. She choked on it and William coughed, covering her blunder and covering his own shock as well. Quickly, Jordan coughed again as if she was clearing her throat and hoped to God that Giselle didn’t catch on.

“Excuse me, please,” she coughed one more time for good measure. “This weather is affecting me.”

Giselle nodded, obviously buying her excuse but it was evident she was waiting for an answer. Jordan swallowed uncomfortably, thinking of a reply, but she could truly see nothing in the woman’s expression other than openness and honesty. Mayhap since they were now sisters-in-law, Giselle felt that such a topic was not taboo. But Jordan was mightily embarrassed.

“Truly, my lady, we have no method,” she replied. “We have simply been blessed.”

“Of course you have,” Giselle replied. “You are young and healthy, but I thought I would ask anyway. You are not showing your condition at all.”

Jordan smiled weakly. “Just wait another month or two and I will be as round as a pig.”

William decided to step in and save his uncomfortable wife. “I understand you are here in London to do some shopping,” he said to his sister-in-law.

“Oh yes, William.” she exclaimed and Jordan sagged with relief. “We have ordered the most lovely furniture, and new trenchers from the silversmith emblazoned with the Wolverhampton crest.”

At that moment, a tinkling bell resounded in the room and Giselle immediately rose. “Ah, dinner,” she said as she took Jordan’s arm. “I do hope everything is to your liking, dear. I know women in the family way are sometimes prone to sickness with certain foods.”

Much to Jordan’s dismay, she began to prattle on about pregnancy again. Jordan shot her husband a disbelieving glance and he returned it helplessly as they were led away to the dinner table.

*

Later that night, after making passionate love to each other, Jordan lay wrapped in William’s arms and he was just drifting off to sleep when suddenly he felt her shake. Concerned, he lifted his head to gaze at the back of her blond head.

“What’s wrong?” he whispered.

She shook again and suddenly burst out with the most robust, gut-busting laughter he had ever heard her utter. She tried to speak to him, but every time she opened her mouth more laughter screamed forth until she was literally crying. William grinned, waiting until she was rational enough to speak but was dying to know what was so funny.

“Oh, I am sorry, English,” she cried. “I shouldna laugh at Giselle, but….” She was off again in gales of hysterical laughter.

Then he understood. With a groan, his head flopped back down onto the pillow. “I am glad you think it is funny, for I was most embarrassed for you,” he said. “God, I could not believe the questions the woman was asking you.”

She rolled onto her back. “Truly, it was pathetic, but I found it so funny that she was entirely serious that it was all I could do to keep from laughing.” She wiped her eyes. “But when she asked me if I conceived the twins on top of you or beneath you, I nearly slid to the floor in hysterics.”

She put her hands on her face, laughing as she had never laughed before. He began to laugh, too, for her humor was catching. It was no time before they were both screaming with laughter, for every time they would look at one another they would start anew. William’s ribs began to hurt.

“And do you rinse your passage with egg white and vinegar to make the man’s seed stick?” he repeated his sister-in-law’s ludicrous questions and Jordan had to sit up or she would choke to death on her own laughter. She could not catch her breath.

“Stop it, stop it!” she ordered him between gasps. “No more! I canna take it!”

William lay back on the pillows, wiping tears from his eyes. “And did you walk around for three days with a cork from a fine bottle of burgundy shoved up you to hold in the male seed so that it could not escape?”

She was laughing so hard no sound was coming forth and she had to stand up to get herself breathing again. She sagged against the wall, hand over her mouth and tears streaming down her face while her husband lay on the bed and giggled like a hysterical woman. Never had they laughed so long and so heartily together. Lord only knew, there had been so little to laugh so freely about.

Jordan wiped at her cheeks, trying to catch her breath and attempting to control her uproar. William’s gasps of laughter died down as well and Jordan was returning to the bed when he started up again.

“Did you wear a Bible strapped between your legs to bless your loins before the seed was deposited?” he asked, his voice cracking.

That was the end of it. Jordan fell to her knees, absolutely hysterical, her head resting on the edge of the bed. She was so weak with laughter that she lacked the simple strength to stand. William was so overcome with laughing fits that he slowly, lethargically moved to where his wife was kneeling beside the bed and put a shaking hand on her head. God, his face hurt from all of the laughing and he thought he might literally get sick.

Kieran and Jemma appeared in their room, having heard the strange sounds of gasping and wheezing. With the door gone, thanks to William and Kieran’s strength, there was virtually no sound barrier.

Jemma saw Jordan on her knees next to the bed and was beside herself. “What’s wrong?” she cried.