Dreaming of You (The Gamblers #2)(106)

Motherhood had brought a new radiance to Sara’s features, while her achievements in her work had given her maturity and confidence. In the past year she had finished another novel, The Scoundrel, which was promised to attain the success of Mathilda. The story, about an ambitious young man who wished to prosper through honest means but was forced by a callous society to resort to crime, had struck a nerve in the public sensibility. Frequently Sara was invited to speak at salon meetings concerning political reform and social issues. She felt that she wasn’t learned or charismatic enough to lecture to such groups of intellectuals, but they virtually insisted on her presence at their gatherings.

“How was your speech?” Derek asked, drawing a gentle finger over the dark fuzz on his daughter’s head.

“I just made a few commonsense remarks. I said that instead of hoping the poor will merely ‘accept their station’ in life, we should give them a chance to make something of themselves…or they’ll turn to dishonest means, and we’ll have more crime.”

“Did they agree?”

Sara smiled and shrugged. “They think I’m a radical.”

Derek laughed. “Politics,” he said, in a tone that conveyed whimsy and scorn at once. His gaze swept over the sight of the nursing baby and lingered on the exposed curve of Sara’s breast.

“What of the hospital?” Sara asked. “Has the construction finally begun?”

He tried to look matter-of-fact, but she could see that he was pleased. “The ground’s been broken.”

Sara’s face lit with a smile of delight.

In the last few months the remains of the club had been cleared. Derek had made no decision on what to do with the property. There was, of course, a demand for him to rebuild Craven’s, for the place was mourned by such influential figures as the duke of Wellington, Lord Alvanley, and even the king. But Derek resisted the public urgings to reestablish the gambling club and devoted himself to other projects. He was building a large, modern hospital to the north of the city, enlisting voluntary contributions and matching each donation with his own money. He was also developing a plot of land in the West End into a row of elegantly furnished town houses, to be leased to foreign travelers, unmarried men, and families who moved to London for the Season.

Sara had teased him lovingly as they looked over the architect’s drawings for the hospital building, a plain but handsome quadrangle. For years Derek had been known as the greatest scoundrel in England, and now he was universally praised for his “reformation.” “You’re becoming known as a public benefactor,” she told him in satisfaction, “whether you like it or not.”

“I don’t like it,” he replied darkly. “I’m only doing this because I’d be bored otherwise.”

Sara had laughed and kissed him, knowing he would forever deny having any altruistic feelings.

When Lydia was finished at Sara’s breast, the nursery maid returned to take her. Sara used a soft cloth to blot her front. She fastened her dress and blushed slightly at Derek’s close regard. His green eyes met hers. “She’s lovely,” he said. “She looks more like you every day.”

Of all the surprises about Derek—and it seemed there was an endless supply—the greatest was his absorption with his daughter. Sara had expected that he would be a kind but uninvolved father. He had never known the relationship between parent and child before. She had thought he might preserve a careful distance between himself and the baby. Instead he loved his daughter with open adoration. Often he would tuck her in the crook of his arm and parade her before guests as if a baby were a lovely miracle none of them had ever seen before. He thought her prodigiously clever for holding his finger, for kicking her legs, for making adorable sounds, for doing all the things that babies usually did…except that in his opinion his daughter did them far better.

“Have several more children,” Lily had advised Sara dryly, “so that his attention will be divided among them. Otherwise he’ll ruin this one.”

Sara didn’t completely understand the reason for his behavior until a recent afternoon, when she had stood with him over the cradle to watch their sleeping daughter. Derek had taken Sara’s hand in his and brought it to his lips. “You’re my heart,” he had murmured. “You’ve given me more happiness than I have a right to. But she…” He glanced down at Lydia wonderingly. “She’s my own flesh and blood.”

Moved by the words, Sara had realized how alone he had always been: no parents, sisters, or brothers, no blood ties of any kind. Her fingers tightened, and she nestled against him. “Now you have a family,” she had said softly.

Bringing her mind back to the present, Sara answered Derek’s earlier comment. “Lydia has black hair, green eyes, and your mouth and chin, and you say she looks like me?”

“She has your nose,” Derek pointed out. “And your temperament.”

Sara laughed, standing up and folding a light blanket into a neat square. “I suppose it’s my temperament when she wakes the household in the middle of the night with her screaming?”

Derek advanced on her unexpectedly and cornered her against the wall. “Well, now,” he murmured, “in the past you’ve been known to raise the roof a time or two, haven’t you?”

Their gazes locked in an electric moment. Thoroughly disconcerted, Sara blushed deeply. She didn’t dare look at the nursery maid in case she had heard. Giving Derek a reproving frown, she ducked beneath his arm and fled, hurrying to the safety of her bedroom. He followed close behind her.