The Vow (29 page)
“Hannah—”
“Two conditions, Reiver.”
He paused, wary now. “What are they?”
“I want legal control of Shaw Silks.”
Reiver burst out laughing. “Don’t be absurd.”
“Oh, I assure you I am quite serious. If I am to suffer the humiliation of raising your mistress’s child, I expect you to pay a very heavy price. So I’ve decided that I want what you love best—your silk mill.” Hannah strolled around the room. “I want sixty percent of your shares, and you may retain ten percent.
So even with James’s and the boys’ shares, you will never gain control from me.”
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His face twisted with rage. “I worked my fingers to the bone to build this company from nothing, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let anyone take it away from me!”
“Oh, you would still run it, of course. But I would expect to be consulted on major decisions, and I would have the final say.”
“Be reasonable. You know nothing about running a silk mill.”
“That’s not true. Who thought of giving our silks an Italian name? Who suggested that another person should know Giuseppe Torelli’s dye formulas?
And I’ve been keeping the accounts. One can learn much from accounts.”
“Women don’t run silk mills, damn it! They’re supposed to raise their children and make a comfortable home for their husbands.”
“Then I shall be the exception.” And her first order of business would be to make sure that children never worked for Shaw Silks again.
He ran his hand through his hair in frustration. “Hannah, this is insane. I can’t agree to it.”
She shrugged. “Fine. Then I suggest you find a suitable foundling home for your little bastard.”
“Don’t call her that, damn you! She’s still my daughter.”
Hannah ran her fingertips over the back of the settee. “And my second condition is that no one can know she’s your daughter. She’ll be my niece, the child of one of my New York cousins who died in childbirth. I offered her a home out of the goodness of my heart. When she’s old enough to understand, you may acknowledge her.”
“You’ve thought of everything, haven’t you?”
“Yes, I believe I have.”
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Reiver’s lip curled in contempt. “You stupid, heartless bitch! You would ruin everything I’ve worked for, just to satisfy your own petty female hunger for vengeance.”
Hannah arched her back like a cat ready to spit and claw. “This isn’t about vengeance, but you’re too bullheaded to see it. This is about protecting my sons’
birthright. If I control this company, you’ll never be able to give it away to your little bas—daughter.”
“Is that what you’re afraid of?” He looked genuinely shocked. “Benjamin and Davey are my sons. I would never cut them out of this company.”
“I don’t trust you anymore, so I’ve got to look out for my own welfare and that of my sons.” She clutched the back of the settee. “You’re an arrogant, selfish man, Reiver Shaw. You married me against my wishes, you never showed my daughter one crumb of affection, and you banished your own brother from his family to salvage your own pride while you continued to see your mistress.”
Two spots of color stained his cheeks, but he made no retort.
“And now, in your supreme arrogance and insensitivity, you expect me to swallow my own pride and raise your mistress’s child.” She steeled herself for what she had to say next. “Perhaps if I thought it would make you love me, I wouldn’t hesitate. But I’ve come to realize that you’ll never love me, no matter what I do. You’ll always love Cecelia first and foremost.”
Hannah hesitated, giving him a moment to deny it, but he didn’t. She continued, “So I expect to be repaid, and handsomely. I’ve named my price.”
“And if I refuse to pay it?”
“You won’t. You may be arrogant and selfish, but you do love your sons and you wouldn’t want them to come to resent you as you resented your own father.
You could send me away, but you would never separate your sons from their mother, even to give your daughter a home. You could also tell the boys of my 250
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affair with Samuel, but then I would go to him and you’d be left raising three children alone.”
Hatred smoldered in his eyes. “I’ll agree to your terms. But know this, Hannah. You’ll control Shaw Silks, but you’ll never control me.”
He strode out of the study and slammed the door behind him.
Trembling, Hannah sank down into the sofa and clasped her cold, shaking hands in her lap.
Her husband had become her worst enemy.
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Chapter Thirteen
Reiver cursed himself for ever agreeing to Hannah’s outrageous, unreasonable demands.
Seated beside his wife in a Hartford—New Haven railway car heading back from New York, he observed Hannah trying to resist the baby cradled in the wet nurse’s arms, and failing.
“Do you think she’s too warm?” Hannah asked Georgia Varner, the placid young farm girl they had hired, for Mrs. Hardy’s advanced age and cantankerous, impatient nature made her unsuitable to care for a demanding infant.
Ginger-haired Georgia, who looked too delicate to lift heavy pails of milk and hoe rock-strewn fields, laid the backs of her fingers against the baby’s forehead. “She doesn’t seem warm at all, Mrs. Shaw.”
Baby Elisabeth—named after Cecelia’ s mother—mewled and wrinkled her tiny face, causing Hannah’s concerned gaze to lock on her with the possessiveness a tigress feels for her cub. “Perhaps she’s hungry.”
“I fed her before we left,” Georgia said. “Would you like to hold her?”
Hannah stiffened. “I’ll only disturb her. She seems quite content in your arms.”
Reiver turned his attention to the lush Connecticut countryside rolling past the window and silently cursed himself again. He had known his wife’s strong maternal instinct would prevail, and he should have insisted that she see the baby first. Then she would have agreed to anything.
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Hannah had outsmarted him. Only when the ink was dry on the papers that gave her legal control of Reiver’s company did she agree to see Cecelia’s child.
To Reiver’s chagrin, the moment they arrived at Amos Tuttle’s house and Hannah held Elisabeth in her arms for the first time, her coldness melted, though she feigned a certain reserve for his benefit. He could tell that this tiny scrap of humanity had moved Hannah and captured her heart. That pleased him.
Hannah said, “Do you think you’ll like living in Connecticut, Georgia?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Her warm hazel eyes never left the baby in her arms. “I wanted to get away from the farm real bad, especially after—” She blushed, obviously thinking of her own stillborn baby born out of wedlock and her own ensuing shame. “Now I have a chance to make a fresh start. I disgraced my family and they weren’t about to let me forget it, especially my pa.”
“Everyone makes mistakes,” Hannah said gently. “Surely your father could forgive you for yours.”
“No, ma’am, not him. I shamed him, and he was going to make me pay.
That’s why I ran away to the big city, to go into service and get away.”
“Well, we’re fortunate to have you,” Reiver said. “I know you’ll take good care of my—” He almost said “daughter” but stopped himself in time.
“Elisabeth.”
The placid Georgia ran one finger down the sleeping baby’s cheek. “Don’t you worry none, Mr. Shaw, I’ll care for her as if she were my own.”
Hannah smiled. “We’re counting on that.”
Georgia’s face clouded. “I feel bad for your cousins, ma’am, perishing together in that fire and leaving this little angel all alone in the world. It’s right charitable of you and Mr. Shaw to take her in.”
“It’s the least we could do,” Hannah said. “Otherwise she would have been sent to a foundling home.”
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Georgia’s eyes widened in indignation. “Surely not!”
Reiver addressed Hannah directly for the first time since they had boarded the train. “My softhearted wife couldn’t bear to let that happen, could you, my dear?”
She met his gaze and held it. “Of course not. I’m sure little Elisabeth will repay us tenfold for our charity.”
Reiver turned his attention back to the scenery. “We should be arriving in Hartford shortly.”
A rapt, wide-eyed Davey peered into the cradle. “She looks all red and wrinkly,” he said, “like a newborn piglet.”
“All babies look like that, you fool,” his brother scoffed. “But they grow out of it. Except for you.”
Sensing tension in the room, Elisabeth screwed up her face and let out a lusty wail.
Hannah glared at them. “Now you’ve made the baby cry.” She lifted Elisabeth onto her shoulder and the wailing ceased.
“I don’t see why she has to come live with us,” Davey grumbled. “She’ll cry all the time and keep us up at night. And when she gets older, she’ll want to tag along after us.”
Benjamin turned pale. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
Hannah said, “By the time Elisabeth is old enough to tag along, you two will be grown men. You mustn’t be so selfish. Elisabeth’s parents are dead and she has nowhere else to go. Just because she’s here doesn’t mean that your father and I love you boys any less.”
They exchanged sheepish looks.
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She smiled. “Both of you are strong, so you must protect your little cousin, not be jealous of her.”
Benjamin gave an indignant snort. “Mother, I am fourteen years old. I am not jealous of a baby.”
Hannah suppressed a smile. “Why don’t the two of you go to the kitchen to see if Mrs. Hardy has baked you anything—unless, of course, you’re too old for cookies.”
The two boys walked out of the nursery with as much adult aplomb as they could muster, leaving Hannah alone with Cecelia’s daughter.
She rested her cheek against the downy head and breathed in the warm sweet scent of baby, fighting back tears as she thought of her own lost Abigail and the child she would never give Samuel.
Despite all her best attempts, she couldn’t harden her heart against a helpless infant, even if she was a living, breathing reminder of her husband’s infidelity.
Yet Reiver knew her better than she knew herself; once she saw the baby and held her, she would love her as fiercely as she loved her own children.
Hannah would never let him know that.
Suddenly the nursery door opened. Reiver stood there, watching her with a strange expression that made her shiver. Ever since she had taken control of his company, he regarded her with barely disguised loathing.
“I’m surprised at you, Hannah,” he said. “Such a display of warm maternal feeling for my mistress’s daughter.”
Hannah set the baby back down in her cradle and faced him. “I don’t believe in blaming an innocent child for the sins of her father. I promised you that I’d raise your daughter as if she were my own, and I shall.” She crossed her arms.
“But never think that she will mean more to me than my own children. That would be a grave mistake.”
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“Oh, I never intend to underestimate you again, dear wife,” he said coldly.
“See that you don’t.” She looked down at Elisabeth, now asleep. “You are right. Shaws do breed true. Elisabeth looks nothing like her mother. She has your hair, your eyes, and Samuel’s chin.” Hannah looked over at Reiver. “I’m surprised James and Mrs. Hardy didn’t notice the resemblance right away.”
“They will, in time.” He walked over to the cradle and peered in. “You’re wrong. She may have my hair and eyes, but she looks exactly like Cecelia. When she grows up, she’ll be exactly like her mother.”
Not if I can help it
, Hannah thought.
Reiver straightened. “What happens now?”
She walked over to a window to put distance between them. “We go our separate ways. You will continue to run Shaw Silks without interference from me—unless, of course, I choose to interfere—while I raise the children.”
He came to stand behind her and she used superhuman effort to keep from stepping away. She could feel the menacing warmth of his breath ruffling the fine hairs on the nape of her neck.
“I’m still a young, virile man,” he said. “I won’t live like a monk.”
She stared down at the boys in the yard below, laughing and talking with Georgia. “Perhaps our new nurse would be willing to become your mistress, once Elisabeth is through nursing. She’s quite comely and sweet-tempered. All I ask is that you be discreet.” She turned to face him. “But then, you always were.”
Rage flared in Reiver’s eyes. “That’s low.”
“I feel nothing for you, and after fifteen years of marriage, I can’t pretend anymore. I’ll, raise your daughter, but I will not share your bed.”
His hand shot out and he grasped her wrist. “I could take you whenever and wherever I wish.”
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Hannah forced herself to remain calm, though her heart was pounding. “Yes, you could. However, the mill would suffer.”
He dropped her wrist as if it had turned white hot and stepped back, letting his gaze rake her over. “You used to be attractive. You were kind, generous, and forgiving, all that a woman should be.” He shook his head. “But you’ve become so twisted and bitter that I doubt if even Samuel would love you now.”
“No matter what you say, Samuel has always loved me, and he always will.”
She raised her head proudly. “He taught me never to allow anyone to denigrate me.”
“That’s before you changed.” His features turned bleak. “You know, since Cecelia died, you haven’t once spared a thought for my suffering. The woman I loved died, Hannah, and I can’t even wear black for her. Do you know what that has done to me?”
She reared back. “You’ll get not one shred of sympathy from me, Reiver Shaw. You and that woman caused me nothing but humiliation and heartache.”
“Why did I think you’d ever understand? You’re nothing but a cold, heartless bitch.”