The Next Best Bride (27 page)

He pulled her against him, kissed her. He would find out the old man's reasoning tomorrow. No doubt it had something to do with taking up his responsibilities. Every conversation with his grandfather seemed to revolve around duty, responsibility, and sacrifice.

For tonight he would lose himself in his wife. Celebrate his coming freedom. He pulled back the covers to kiss her abdomen through the linen of her nightdress, ignoring her half-hearted protests.

They would have a son, he could feel it in his bones. Freedom. God, he had waited so long for it.

* * * * *

Though he had slept little, Rand did not want to put off the confrontation with his grandfather. He strode up the path to the main house, thinking that he was glad to be home for once in his miserable life. He had a wife who welcomed her into his bed, though she ought more probably guard it from him. He had a good chance of being master of his fortunes in no more than seven months at the most.

He wasn't really used to being as cheerful as he appeared, but he liked the feeling. The best part of all was knowing there was nothing the old man could do to ruin things, unless he wanted to consign his title to die out. And that the Marquess of Markingham would never do.

Folkstone showed him to the library as if he were expected. No doubt he had been. He did not waste time with pleasantries that he knew would only irritate his grandfather. "Why did you send me a note saying that Helena was ill?"

For once, he felt he had the upper hand and didn't mind showing his true feelings. Irritation. Anger.

The old man chose to respond with innocent surprise. "Isn't she?"

He thought of Helena as she had been last night. This morning. "Not in any sense that can be helped within the next six to seven months."

"I see you have talked to your wife, then. Did you wake her, despite thinking her ill?" There was a faint undertone of disapproval.

Rand refused to allow himself to be put on the defensive. "She woke when I checked on her." He grinned. "She is most definitely healthy."

His grandfather seemed unduly interested in his words. The green eyes scanned his face with the fierce attention of a bird of prey. "So you shared her bed? Why? You have already secured your wager."

Not understanding why the old man showed such interest, Rand strove for a matter of fact tone. "I wanted her. My wife is a beautiful woman, grandfather."

"Yes. And you are not one to resist a taste of beautiful apple, are you? Not even if there is a worm in it." There was mockery in his grandfather's words. Rand had a foreboding sense that he had missed some detail and things were not as secure as he had believed.

A worm? Rand stripped the defensiveness from his tone, seeking to inject simple carnality in its place. "She is my wife, grandfather. I don't see the need to deny myself. Even if my wager is as good as won."

"Yet you have stayed away two months, and would have stayed longer if I had not seen that you made your way home." The old man scrutinized him, much as he had when Rand was a boy and had caused some trouble or other. "Had you some reason to assume she was breeding when you left?"

"None, other than knowing I had done my best to leave her so."

"And yet you left."

"I could bear no more of quiet nights, grandfather. I wished to be back in the bustle of the city."

"Are you pleased about the news?"

"Delighted." He knew his tone was too bitter, but he wasn't sure what face to present to the old man. He was tired. He had slept very little.

Perhaps he should have waited to confront his grandfather. There was an uneasy undercurrent that threatened bad tidings, if he were not too exhausted to avoid whatever mistake he was on the verge of making. And he was beginning to realize that what had seemed simple not so very long ago, was more complicated and fraught with dangers than he liked to think.

"We should drink to the increased likelihood you will win the wager you made in London, should the child not be a girl, of course." The marquess poured them both brandies.

Rand raised his glass. "And the increased chance that Saladin will be mine, as well."

His grandfather halted the glass at his lips and peered over the rim at Rand. There was a calculated gleam in his eye. An all too familiar gleam. "I'm not so sure of that."

Rand braced himself for the blow. "What do you mean?"

His grandfather's tone was congenial, as if he were confiding his own weakness. "I don't know about your London cronies, but I'm not willing to accept just any mewling brat to satisfy our bet."

Because his grandfather enjoyed his discomfort, Rand strove to look puzzled but not concerned. "A girl does not satisfy the wager, I know. But surely a son does. He needn't be born with a golden spoon between his lips, I hope."

"No." The marquess sat back, took a sip of his brandy. "He just needs to be born from your seed."

Rand allowed a small measure of his profound shock to show. "Besides the fact that there has been no other man around her while she was at Parsleigh, I assure you that I made my bid for an heir daily."

"Did you know she had a lover before you married?"

Rand again chose not to hide his surprise, although the sick feeling from the last blow intensified. "How the devil could you know that?"

The old man waved the question away as if it were of little consequence. "I have my sources, though they were sorely tried when you switched brides at the last minute. I see you are not as big a fool as I thought you. Did you know before or after you married her?"

Sources. His grandfather always had sources. But who... Her lover. There was no one else. Helena had only told Ros and Ros would never have told another soul. Only the fool who had taken advantage of her could have spoken of it. In jest? In confidence? In his cups? Did it matter? His grandfather knew.

He sighed. "It was over before we married."

"Over, but perhaps not forgotten."

Rand froze, realizing the quicksand he walked upon. He had not cared if Helena had her lover's child. His grandfather would find such a thing intolerable. "The child is mine."

His grandfather leaned forward, all pretense of geniality stripped from his features. "How can you be certain?"

"I am." Even as he spoke the words firmly, Rand knew his grandfather would require more than the word of an irresponsible rake on a matter of such importance.

As if to confirm his thoughts, the marquess sighed gustily. "What do you suppose a fitting consequence should be for a woman who carries a child of uncertain parentage?" He added almost gently, "This is not a matter for a careless wager that she spoke the truth, Rand. This is a matter of my blood, my honor, my heir."

His heir. As if Rand had played some middle man in a tradesman's bargain. "My heir's paternity is in no doubt. Anyone who dares say otherwise will meet me at dawn, I assure you."

"Ah yes. A duel." His grandfather looked as though he had smelled something unpleasant. "I know you have had your share of such foolery. But what have they ever proven but the lunacy of men who would risk death to prove nothing. I'm sorry, but I don't find a dead fool any more or less worth believing than he was when he was alive."

Lunacy. Rand felt the threat. He tasted bile. "My child. I have no doubt."

His grandfather sat back, as if willing to hear him out. "Then ease my mind. Tell me how you are certain."

Reluctantly, he said, "She began her menses before we married." He added detail for veracity, knowing how his grandfather prized detail. "That is why I was in no hurry to find my bed on my wedding night."

"You should have waited a month or more. To be sure. Women have been known to lie about such things."

"Not Helena."

The marquess's gaze was pitiless. "Has she command of your brains then, as well as your cock?"

Rand stared at him, burying his horror. He had thought Helena was safe as long as she was carrying his child. But with this turn... He took the only retreat he could think of. Standing, he slammed his brandy on the desk. "I would no more be fooled by a beautiful face than I would allow a cuckoo in my nest. The child is mine, grandfather. I will listen to no more insinuations."

"There is a man who claims otherwise. And he asked a handsome price for this." His grandfather handed him a folded piece of paper. Sketch paper, like the kind that came from an artist's notebook such as Helena used.

Rand unfolded it numbly and looked down on the face of her lover as seen through Helena's eyes when she thought she would marry the man. He looked back to his grandfather. "I hope you did not pay much for this. It proves nothing but that she liked his face enough to draw it."
Loved him enough to draw him. To give herself to him.
He put the thought from his mind.

His grandfather snorted. "Perhaps alone it could be questioned. But the girl wears her heart on her sketchpad not her sleeve, my boy. It is some comfort that she seems to have given her heart to you, considering the sketches she has done that put you in much better light than you deserve. Have you seen the painting she has done?"

Rand folded the sketch and tossed it into the fire, watching as it turned to ash. "The child is mine. There is no doubt." He turned on his heel and left, trying to erase the image of the mocking smile forming on his grandfather's lips. He wanted to be sick. He wanted to rage against the unkind hand fate had just dealt him. Again.

If the marquess doubted the child's paternity, Helena was in danger. The truth mattered little if the marquess could not find some way to confirm it for himself. And that was, no doubt, why he had called Nanny Bea away from Avonmeade. The woman had been a midwife before she was a nanny. If she did not confirm the child must be Rand's blood? What then?

As Rand walked to the dower house where his wife was waiting, three thoughts repeated in time with his steps: Helena carried his child. She was in serious danger. He did not know how to protect her.

Chapter Twenty One

Helena dappled a final bit of green for the eyes and sighed. Finished. She arched her aching back, knowing that soon she could no longer take the hours of standing required to do a large portrait such as this one. Fortunately, she had planned nothing for the immediate future but a small watercolor of the dower house to hang in the nursery.

She glanced at the man in the portrait. She had captured him as she saw him. Would the subject be pleased or displeased? She had done a good job in bringing the essence of the man she knew to the canvas, but would he agree? Or would he think she had idealized him beyond necessity?

A glance at the window confirmed that the light was nearly gone. And Rand was still not returned from speaking with his grandfather. Had they fought? Two strong-willed men battling over what? Names? Schools? Surely it was much too soon for those battles. Though she did not doubt that they would come in time.

"You've done a good job capturing the earl." Nanny Bea spoke softly, as if afraid to startle her.

"Thank you." Helena could not suppress a yawn. "I find that my work tires me much too easily of late."

Balancing a small tray of tea and biscuits, Nanny Bea hesitated, and then nodded as if she had made a decision. "Only natural, milady. Why don't you have a lie down before dinner? I'll bring your tea up with us, then."

"That would be lovely." Helena went willingly up the stairs. A lie down seemed the perfect thing for her exhausted and aching body.

Once in her room, the nanny bustled her into bed, plumping pillows and fluffing covers.

"I'm not ill, you know."

"Of course not, milady." Nanny Bea set the tea tray on her lap. "Now drink your tea."

"I'd really rather just sleep, I think."

"Nonsense. You must keep up your strength. Drink your tea for me and eat a biscuit and then you can sleep all you like."

"Perhaps when I wake?"

"Do I know what is good for you, milady?"

"Do you?" Rand's voice cut across the quiet of the room and Helena was suddenly wide awake.

"Rand." She sat up, careful not to upset the tea tray. "I did not know you had returned. I finished your portrait today and I wanted to show it to you. How did your talk with your grandfather go."

"Fine." He moved across the room and took the tray from her lap.

"It is best if she have her tea, milord."

"She does not want it."

Helena watched the conversation over the tea and knew that somehow they were discussing more than tea. The undercurrent of tension was palpable.

He stood holding the tray as if he might dash it at Nanny Bea should the woman dare cross him.

"Don't be a goose, Rand. I am not so tired as I was, bring me the tea and I will drink it."

"As you wish." He smiled, but there was a clear flash of fury in his eyes. Somehow, as he moved toward her, the tray slipped from his hold, spilling the teapot, mug, plate and biscuits to the floor. Everything shattered into a thousand pieces.

There was a moment of silent horror as they all three surveyed the damage. And then Rand sighed. "I am more exhausted from my travel than I thought if I could be so clumsy."

"No matter, milord. I can brew her another cup." Nanny Bea smiled, but there was sadness in her gaze, Helena was certain, before she bent and began to gather the shattered remains into her apron.

"Leave that for Dibby." Rand frowned at the bent figure of the woman, who ignored him. He turned his gaze up to Helena, shrugged and smiled. She could sense that the smile was an effort. What had gotten into him?

He sat beside her on the bed and kissed her forehead. She hoped for a moment that he might join her, but he only said, "Rest now, Helena. All will be well when you wake."

Her fatigue returned in a crushing wave as the drama of the last few moments faded from her blood. She wanted to ask him why the sadness of his voice belied the comfort of his words. But she was too tired to form the words.

Rand watched her fall asleep right before his eyes. He could sense the exhaustion in her heavy lidded gaze. He knew she fought it, but the battle was lost in an instant. Was this what he had done to her?