Addicted (34 page)

“Why wouldn’t I have followed you? Christ, Anais, I loved you. I wanted to marry you. I told you that, the night in the stable.”

“I didn’t plan…” She stopped and reached out with her hand to steady herself on the edge of the dressing table. “I lost my faith in you, Lindsay. After finding you with Rebecca…I…I couldn’t see you again. Don’t you see? It…it could never be. Oh, God, it might have been all different.”

The stricken sob that came from her cut him to the quick and suddenly he stopped and faced her, clarity at last beginning to chase the chaos in his head away.

Incredulity was swiftly replaced with dawning horror. “Where is the child?”

He had yelled that, unable to control his emotions and the frenzied anger that began to erupt like a volcano within him. She flinched and pressed her naked body against the wall, her head lowering, her gaze unable to meet his.
What had she done with his child?

Filled with utter terror, he stalked to her and took her about the shoulders. “Damn you, Anais, what have you done? Where is it?”

“She is safe.”

He fell back a step.
A daughter…a father…
He looked about the room, stunned, shocked. Anais giving birth to his child—
his daughter.

Anais slid along the wall until she was within reach of the pile of underthings he had carelessly discarded into a heap. He watched as she bent at the knees and retrieved her chemise, immediately covering her lush breasts and fertile belly.

“What have you done with our daughter?” he asked on a strangled whisper. Damn her, he had a child—a child she had hidden from him. He had the right to know. He had the right to be a father, to claim this babe, a babe he had known nothing about.

“You needn’t worry. She is safe and loved.”

A terrifying fear began to grip him. “What do you mean?” he thundered.

“I have seen to her safekeeping—I…” She looked away and sniffed back her tears. “Surely you understand that I…I couldn’t keep her.”

With a cry of horror he released her, shoving her away. “What have you done?” he asked, the whispered sound filled with horror.

“The only thing I could have done as an unmarried woman who found herself with child.”

“I wanted to marry you—” he ground out “—I wanted you. I wanted that child. I did not leave you, Anais. You hid from me when I was trying so desperately to find you.”

She covered her face with her hands and sobbed. “I didn’t know.”

“Where is my child?” he roared, beginning to lose control of the anger and pain that was slashing like a knife through his chest.

“You don’t understand…I had no choice…I had to make a decision, it is too late to change what has already been done.”

Emotions tripped through him, ripping him apart, destroying his ability to think with anything that resembled rationality. He was confused, lost. The voices in his head taunted him like hecklers jeering the actors in Drury Lane.

Broughton and the Darnby chit have been keeping secrets from you.
Over and over again, he heard his father’s gravelly voice. The phrase was now like a goddamned mantra in his mind.

“So you refuse to tell me?” he asked incredulously. “I am not meant to learn of my child’s fate, is that it? I have no rights?”

“If you would only hear me—”

“Oh, I hear you. I am to have no rights because I betrayed you, because you deem me worthless because of the opium. I am meant to have no heart, to not give a damn that my daughter is somewhere out in the world, and I was never meant to know about her. What do you think I am, Anais? A monster? Did you think I wouldn’t care? Did you think to hide this from me…forever?”

“Garrett said—” She stopped, shook her head.

“Garrett said what?”

She would not answer him, leaving him to reflect on everything he had learned. “What is done is done, Lindsay. There is no return, for either of us.”

Thank you, Garrett. Thank you for everything…
Anais’s words to Broughton at the cottage came to him. His head snapped up and he searched Anais’s face, dread dawning in his mind as the clues rushed in like high tide, overwhelming him as wave after wave of realizations came rushing in his mind, sucking him under until he thought he would drown.

Traveling so far and so close to your day, Mrs. Middleton, and in such weather?

She was born early, neither of us expected, that is, er…well, Robert was with me you see…

We have a tie that binds us, Anais. A tie that binds forever….

He thought of Margaret Middleton’s unease that night in the salon when he peered down at her child. Remembered the shared look of uncertainty that flashed between Middleton and his wife. Had Anais looked nervous? Had she even looked at the child?

The thought just wouldn’t let go. He couldn’t shake it, and the longer he thought about it—about the injustice, the impotence of the whole thing, he became angrier and angrier, until he saw only red and roared, “You gave my daughter to Robert Middleton and his wife!”

She did not need to say anything. The shock and mortification on her face told him what he needed to know and he staggered back, far away from her. The heel of his boot hit the edge of the bed and he fell against the mattress, shocked, sickened.

“Let me explain,” she said, rallying her spirits.

He looked up at her through a blurred cloud—tears. He had not openly wept since he’d been a beardless boy. Mist had gathered in his eyes the morning he awoke after his betrayal of Anais—he had snuffed the tears with opium. He had always killed the pain with opium. But he didn’t have the opium now—he didn’t have its safety infusing his veins. He was on his own—alone to suffer through this gut-wrenching agony.

“Lindsay, please hear me,” she pleaded as tears streaked down her cheeks.

“You gave my child—
my daughter
—away,” he mumbled, his voice filled with disbelief. And suddenly he could not look at her. Could not stand to be near her.

Jumping up from the bed, he stalked to the door, his long legs hungrily eating up the space between the bed and the door.

“Where are you going?” she cried, running for him, preventing him from grasping the doorknob by clinging wildly to his hand. He brushed her puny attempts aside and flung the door wide-open—hard—so hard it reverberated against the wall, sending a picture crashing to the floor. Lindsay bolted into the hall, shaking her grasping hands from his shoulders.

“Don’t do this, you will ruin everything.”

He stopped at the bottom of the stairs and turned slowly on his heel to look up at her. He had left her standing in her chemise and stockings at the top of the stairs. As he looked up at her, nothing but pain coursed in his blood.

“No, Anais,” he said, pointing his finger in the air. “
You
have ruined everything.”

Within minutes, Lindsay left the house for the stables. Furiously, his fingers maneuvered the bridle and bit into Sultan’s mouth. Seconds later the Arabian was saddled and charging out the stable doors.

It was twilight. Lindsay ran the stallion hard through the snowy paths in the woods, heedless of the low-hanging branches and the patches of ice that littered the twisting paths. The beating of hooves pounding on the packed snow and the rhythmic grunts from deep within the Arabian’s heaving chest filled Lindsay’s ears, driving out the other thoughts that were threatening to turn him into a raving lunatic.

Anger drove him on, and harder he ran his mount, his body now one with the stallion as he guided Sultan with ease through the winding curves until they cleared the trees and Broughton’s estates loomed ahead of them. Pushing Sultan on, Lindsay bent low over the saddle, his greatcoat whipping violently behind him as the stallion’s long legs devoured the remaining distance. The animal’s snorting, heavy breaths rushed out of its flaring nostrils, painting the darkening night air in gray clouds.

“Walk him,” he ordered in a chilling voice as he brought Sultan to a prancing halt and tossed his reins to a servant in Broughton’s stable yard.

Pulling his gloves from his hands, Lindsay stalked with ruthless determination up the stairs of The Lodge and let himself in. Sands, Broughton’s butler, in the midst of reaching for the door latch, shrieked in surprise, but recovered with aplomb, masking his shock and distaste behind an inscrutable mask of propriety.

“Oh, good evening, my lord. It is good to see you again.”

Sands studied him from the top of his windblown hair to his chest, which was covered in only a shirt and an open greatcoat. With an arch of a haughty brow, the servant raised his gaze. “You appear to have forgotten to dress for tonight’s dinner, my lord.”

“Where is Broughton?” he growled, slapping his gloves down atop the hall table. He didn’t wait for Sands to assist him with his coat. Instead, Lindsay tossed it atop his gloves before turning his head and glaring at the servant. “Get him. We have business.”

Sands swallowed hard and blinked back his surprise. “I’m afraid his lordship is busy at the moment. He has asked not to be disturbed.”

“Out of my way. I’ll announce myself.”

With his boots ringing on the marble tiles, Lindsay made his way to Broughton’s study. Trying the knob, he found it locked. “Broughton,” he snarled after pounding his fist against the wood. “Broughton, open up this goddamned door!
Now!
”

“I am busy at the moment,” came the cool, controlled response.

With a vicious kick, Lindsay rammed the toe of his boot beneath the door and tried to shoulder it open. It didn’t budge. Red mist gathered behind his eyes until all he saw before him was rage. “I said open this goddamned door or every servant in this house will be privy to what I have to say!”

Lindsay’s fist was poised to strike the door again when it suddenly opened. Barging through, he found Broughton standing in the middle of the room, eyeing him with open hauteur.

Everything inside Lindsay went to hell. Charging in like a snarling bull, he went to Broughton, prepared to slam his fist
in his face. “You goddamned bastard,” he snarled, breathless with rage. “I’ll kill you for this.”

“Shut the door, Raeburn,” Broughton snapped as he walked around his desk.

“You stole her. You stole my daughter.”

“So you did find out, did you? How did you decipher it all, when your head is usually filled with opium?”

“I’m going to let you live long enough to tell me all I want to know, and then,” Lindsay said with frigid preciseness, “I’m going to gut you and make you suffer for what you have done.”

Broughton’s lips turned into a half smile and he turned away, giving Lindsay his back. “What have I done that is so abhorrent? I saved Anais from certain shame and humiliation. I saved the babe and gave her a home in which she will be safe and loved and have a prominent place in society. So tell me,” Broughton roared, whirling on him, “why am I the damned villain when you have done nothing but frig off to the ends of the world while I was cleaning up your mistake?”

“Shut your mouth!” Lindsay ground out through set teeth. “The conception of that child was
not
a mistake, damn you!”

Broughton stepped forward. “Where were you, Raeburn, when she was throwing up every morning? Where were you when Anais was out in the garden weeping because she was alone and with child and so close to having her secret discovered? Where were you when Anais needed someone to help her plan for her and the child’s future? I’ll tell you where, you were nowhere to be found. You were off with your opium and your pipe. And I was here to pick up the pieces. Here to console a
woman you left pregnant. Here to protect the reputation of a friend.”

“I was in France, searching for her.”

“She wasn’t bloody in France, was she?” Broughton shot back. “She was here all along, where you left her, pregnant with your child.”

Broughton was a liar. Anais had told him she had gone to France. He had told her that he had followed her there. Unless of course, going to France was just another one of her lies.

“I told you to have a care for her, but you knew better. You and your damn opium—”

“My bad choices do not give you the right to do what you’ve done. You gave
my
child to your brother.”

“That’s right. I would have taken the babe for mine,” he taunted, and smiled when Lindsay’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, that’s right. I wanted to marry her, even if that meant claiming your son as the next Earl of Broughton. I was prepared to give your babe more than my surname, I was prepared to bequeath him my title. But she wouldn’t marry me. Even though you had betrayed her with Rebecca and left, leaving her with child. Even though it became more and more apparent that you would not return before the child was born, she still remained faithful, hoping against hope that you would come back and do the right thing.”

“I didn’t know!”

“Why didn’t you write? I went nearly every day to Eden Park to see if you had written your mother. I was hoping that you would have at least notified her of your where abouts. I had every intention of writing to you then, to tell you of Anais’s condition. But you were too damn busy indulging in your addiction to bother
putting a quill to paper. Every day, Raeburn, I made the trek to your home to inquire whether or not someone had learned of your whereabouts.
Every damn day
I had to go back to Anais and tell her that there was still no news from you. And every day, I would try to reason with her. Would try to make her see that marrying me and allowing me to give the child the protection of my name was the right thing to do. But she could not do it. She loved you, despite it all. Despite everything you’d done, she could not bring herself to love me enough to marry me. Instead, she wept and pined for a selfish prick that got what he wanted from her and dithered with her friend the first chance he got.”

Guilt, shame, reality began to override his anger. “You did this to spite me! You did this to revenge yourself upon me. You always wanted her for yourself and now you’ve found a way to bind her to you.”

“She won’t have me!” Broughton fisted his hands at his sides. “I bet you take delight in the fact, don’t you? I wager you love knowing that despite everything I’ve done for her, she still cannot bring herself to marry me. Oh, she clings to the story that it’s uncertain if she will ever bear another child. She tries to make me believe she is thinking of me and my heir, but I know that she uses that excuse as a crutch, a way to keep me at arm’s length.”