If He's Wicked. Hannah Howell

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СКАЧАТЬ someone else’s child,” he snapped. “That was not my child.”

      “I know, m’lord. It was my sister’s.”

      Julian was shocked speechless. As he slowly recovered his wits enough to start asking a few questions, he became acutely aware of a new, very pressing need. He tried to will it away, but reluctantly accepted that his body was not willing to wait until he got the answers he needed.

      “Damnation,” he muttered. “We need to talk about that, but, right now,” he hesitated, then said, “I need some privacy.”

      “Ah, I understand.” Chloe stood up, quickly guessing what he needed, and moved toward the door. “I will have the answers to your questions when I return.”

      “How can she know what my questions will even be?” he asked Leopold the moment Chloe was gone and Edgar quickly moved to help him tend to his personal needs.

      “Oh, she can easily guess,” replied Leopold.

      Julian fought down a sense of humiliation as the two men helped him, washed him down, and put him in a clean nightshirt. He hated being so weak and helpless but had to accept that he was both at the moment and that he needed all the help he could get. Once settled back in his bed, he needed a few moments to still the trembling in his body and will his pain to recede. When he finally opened his eyes again, he gave the two men watching him with concern a weak smile. Then he recalled what Chloe had said and frowned. Julian decided he must have misheard her.

      “Did she really say that the child was her sister’s?” he asked. “That I have interred her sister’s child in my family crypt?”

      Leopold sighed and nodded. “Her sister Laurel’s child. Laurel married a poor man who died whilst out fishing. She knew she would not survive the birth of her child, that she was too weakened by a recurring fever and grief. Two men came whilst Laurel lay dying on her childbed, her babe born dead, and they took the child away.”

      “But why? Was Beatrice feigning that she was with child? Was it all a lie?”

      “Oh, nay, not all,” said Chloe as she entered the room and walked to the side of his bed, allowing little Anthony to remain hidden behind her skirts for the moment. “Your wife was indeed with child. She and Laurel took to their birthing beds at the same time, something your wife was well aware of as she held the midwife in her power. S’truth, I think the midwife made certain that both women birthed their children at the same moment.”

      “That makes no sense,” Julian muttered. “If Beatrice was with child, what happened to it? Where is it buried?”

      “It is not buried, m’lord, although Laurel and I worked very hard to make your wife believe the child lies in a grave with Laurel. A trade was made. Lady Beatrice’s live child for my sister’s dead one.”

      “Again—why? To what purpose?”

      “Why? Because the very last thing your wife and uncle wanted was for you to have an heir.”

      “If the child was even mine. That woman was never faithful.”

      Chloe stared at him for a moment and then smiled. “Then it seems you won the luck of the draw, m’lord. The child is yours.”

      “You have seen the child? You know what happened to the baby?”

      “The baby has been well cared for.” Chloe tugged Anthony out from behind her until he stood in front of her. “The child is the very image of his father. My lord, meet Anthony Peter Chadwick Kenwood—your son and heir.”

      Julian stared into eyes the same verdant green as his own. Thick golden curls topped the boy’s head, sharply reminding Julian of his own boyish curls. Julian looked at the three adults all watching him intently and then looked into those eyes that marked the child as his own. Even as he opened his mouth to speak, he felt himself tumble into blackness.

      Chapter 2

      “What happened?”

      Chloe turned from tending the fire the instant she heard those softly croaked words and walked back to stand by the bed. “You swooned, m’lord,” she replied.

      It took Julian a moment to recall where he was and who this delicate woman was. “I never swoon.”

      “I fear you have blotted your copy book this time. You have been out cold for three hours.”

      “Where is Edgar? And Lord Sir Leopold?”

      She noticed he did not ask after little Anthony. “They are in the parlor playing with your son.”

      Lord Julian turned so pale that Chloe reached for him. It startled her when he grabbed her hand in a tight hold and looked around the room a little frantically. When he finally looked at her again it was a struggle to keep her own expression one of gentle concern. For the moment, he was not the earl, or even that lecherous debaucher of the last year. He was simply a man trying desperately to cope with the pain of an enormous betrayal. She cautiously returned his tight grasp.

      “Tell me exactly how you came to have the boy?” Julian asked, thinking it odd that holding her small hand should bring him a measure of comfort, but reluctant to give that up.

      “If you will be patient, I shall begin at the very beginning,” Chloe said. “When my sister’s husband died, she grew ill with grief. She was already several months gone with child, and that also sapped her strength. We both knew she would not survive the birthing and soon doubted that her child would, either. We knew your wife was also carrying a child and soon knew her plans for it.”

      “How?”

      “Let me explain that later, please. So, knowing what was to come, we gathered the bones of an infant. As is custom, London graveyards are often cleared of the long dead to make room for the newly dead. During one of the times that Laurel felt somewhat stronger, we went to London and gathered the bones we needed. We then returned to our cottage on the moors that stretch between Colinsmoor and the baron of Darkvale’s property. And then we waited. My sister grew weaker and the birthing was hard, the bleeding—” Chloe took a deep breath to push aside a lingering grief. “Two men arrived and so I hid myself away. They took poor little Charles Henry, who was stillborn, and set Anthony in my sister’s arms. One man, Jake Potter, could not just walk away. He tried to make my dying sister and the baby comfortable and warm, even building a fire. Then he slipped some papers beneath her covers, telling her that he and a few others had gathered what proof they could for the boy so that, if he survived, he could prove who he was.”

      “But he did no more? He just left her and the child alone and helpless?”

      “He was afraid. They are all afraid at Colinsmoor. People who disobey do not live long. Jake’s partner reminded him of that sad truth. Something about a man named Melvin and a pit. Leopold knows more about all that than I do. The moment Jake left, I rejoined my sister. She soon died, but she was at peace with it. I buried her and that poor babe’s bones near the cottage. Then I took Anthony and headed for London to join Leopold, who was expecting me. For the last three years we have waited for you to learn the truth about your wife.”

      “I have known most of it for a year now.”

      “True, but you did not take it well, did you? The way you behaved made Leopold СКАЧАТЬ