A Scandalous Marriage (24 page)

Devon leaned down, taking her face in his. “You are the boldest, most courageous woman I know. I am here for you.”

She smiled then. “I know.” She took two steps toward the door where a liveried footman waited, but then paused. She came back to him, reached up, and gave him a kiss. “Thank you.” Before he could comment, the footman opened the door, and she walked inside.

Devon brushed his finger against his jaw where she had placed the kiss. “I love you,” he whispered.

Back in the Morning Room, Venetia confronted her son. “Have you no sensibility? How can you just sit there, while Devon ruins the family? Father would have a fit if he knew Richard Carrollton was under this roof. This would kill him. It would!”

“Then perhaps we should tell him,” her son said calmly.

Venetia stared at Rex. “But he is growing stronger. You heard Devon, and Dr. Partridge has not been down here the way he usually is when Father is sleeping.”

Rex shrugged. “I’m merely suggesting that he should be made aware of what Devon’s disastrous marriage is costing this family.”

“He should,” she agreed.

Rex rose from the table, putting the folded paper aside. He looked down the hallway. “I wonder what they were discussing?”

“Who?”

“Didn’t you notice, Mother? Devon and his wife were having a heated exchange, and they didn’t want anyone to overhear them.”

“I don’t want to discuss Devon,” she complained. “One of my headaches arrived almost the moment he did. I confronted that Carrollton chit last night. I was so angry and overwrought that Devon could sweep in here and cheat you out of what is yours. You were trained for it. Father trained you himself. I can’t believe after all this time, Devon fathered a child. I can’t.”

“I don’t think he did.”

“What?” She looked up expectantly. “What do you know?”

“Nothing yet. I visited my club last night. The last I or anyone had heard Devon was up in Scotland hunting with McDermott. I mean, he hasn’t been in London for what? Almost a year? And it wasn’t as if his path didn’t occasionally cross that of people we know. Someone would have mentioned a wife to us.” He nodded to the papers. “Especially one that causes this type of furor. We would have heard well before now if Devon had married Leah Carrollton nine months or more ago.”

“What are you saying? That she really isn’t his wife?” Venetia found that beyond belief.

“Or that the child isn’t really his.”

“But that would be incredible behavior—even for him.”

Rex sat down in the chair across from hers. “What is
credible
behavior, Mother?” He leaned forward, an arm resting on the table, his voice low lest a servant should chance to come in and interrupt them. “My cousin has always envied me, especially when my first son was born. He pretended to be happy, but he almost choked over the words of congratulations. What if he and Miss Carrollton had planned an elaborate ruse? They could be passing off some crofter’s child as Devon’s.”

“But the baby looks like Devon.”

Rex shrugged. “Why? Because it has black hair? Under that definition, half the babies in England could be Devon’s.”

Her eyes brightened with anticipation. “He always wanted to cut you out of your inheritance.”

“He won’t. I won’t let him.”

“This is beyond the pale! Huxhold has crossed the line. I’ve talked to Father over the years about setting Huxhold aside in favor of you, but Father said it is impossible. Even if he agreed to such an idea, which he doesn’t, he claims it couldn’t be done.”

Rex nodded. “But what if we caught Devon doing something so offensive to Grandfather’s sense of honor that he was moved into petitioning Parliament into letting him set Devon aside?”

Venetia went still. “Parliament would do that?”

Her son shrugged. “Anything is possible with Grandfather’s influence and money.”

“Do you really believe Huxhold is up to something?”

Rex smiled. “I watched Leah Carrollton last night when Huxhold presented the baby to Grandfather.

She was tense, not triumphant. And consider the way she ran out of the room later. Something is afoot.”

Venetia tapped the side of her teacup thoughtfully. “So what do you propose we do?”

“I’m going to ask a few questions.”

“Of whom?”

“Wills told me that Huxhold arrived in Ruskin’s coach. I will start there.” He pushed the top newspaper toward her. “And I will pay a call to Lord Carruthers, who is the source of much of the information in today’s papers.”

“What shall I do while you are out and about? Shall I take her to heart and introduce her to my friends and my acquaintances?” She wanted so much to play a part.

He grinned. “Be yourself, Mother. No one would believe you would be at all gracious toward a Carrollton or Huxhold’s wife. Continue to behave exactly as you are. It will make Huxhold angry, and he won’t be paying attention to what I’m doing.”

“Father will be angry if he discovers you’ve been asking questions that could embarrass the family.”

Rex pushed his chair back from the table. “I’m wagering he will be even angrier at Huxhold if we uncover a fraud.”

She had to agree that her son was right. Either way, considering the stakes, it was worth the risk. Rex deserved the title, not Devon.

“Mother,” Rex said thoughtfully, “perhaps you should pay a bedside visit to Grandfather. Let him know the house is full of Carrolltons. He may be furious enough to toss Devon out.”

“Or he could suffer a setback.”

“Yes,” her son agreed without concern.

Venetia did not question his motives. Instead, she hurried to do his bidding. Anything for her son.

Regina Carrollton had been a noted Spanish beauty in her day. Leah shared her mother’s exotic features—black-as-night eyes and thick, glossy hair.

Regina’s family, one of the oldest in Spain, had sent her to London for a rich English husband— and also because there had been a whisper of scandal attached to her name. But in London, she had again made a mistake. She’d fallen in love with a charming, penniless nobleman who’d wooed her with a host of promises that he could never have kept.

Leah knew her mother’s history. She had been her mother’s confidante, her closest friend, because even after all her years in England, Regina had always felt like a foreigner.

The footman closed the door behind Leah. The curtains were open, and white winter light filled the room, where her parents stood in a window alcove.

Her father might technically be the head of the family, but in truth, her mother was the dominant partner.

She took care of the money and staved off creditors. She ran the house and raised the children and worried about the future of her family.

Silence stretched among them as they stood on opposite ends of the room, her parents with each other, she with Ben. So much could be said— words of anger, recrimination, betrayal. And yet, she could not bring herself to speak.

She waited, afraid and fearless. A daughter and a mother.

Then, her mother shifted away from her father and came forward. She stopped when they stood no more than an arm’s width apart. Leah stared at her mother, unable to move or speak.

It was her mother who spoke first. She fell to her knees. “
Cara
, forgive me.”

At that, Leah broke down. Sound escaped her body in a great, heaving sob. Slowly she bent until she was beside her mother on the floor.

Her mother’s arms came around her. “I was so wrong,” she confessed in Spanish, a language her father had never learned but Leah had. “I worried every day. I feared you dead. I am so sorry to have chased you away.” Her hold tightened, and Leah was happy to be in her mother’s arms once again.

The two women cried, their tears mingling as they hugged each other. Her mother pulled back, pressed a hand against her cheek to dry tears. “What is this?” she asked in English.

Now Leah found herself smiling through the tears. She held Ben so that her mother could see his sweet face. “He is my son.”

Her mother drew in a soft breath of exclamation. Her hands opened as if she would embrace the child.

Fresh tears poured from her eyes. “He is beautiful.” She would have said more, but her lower lip trembled, and Leah understood. Between them were regrets so deep that mere words could not describe them.

Leah wrapped her arm around her mother and kissed her cheek. “It will all be fine. From now on, everything will be fine.”

“Oh,
cara
, I pray it is so. I beg your forgiveness.”

“You always had it, Mother,” she answered, understanding so much more now than before she’d left home. She had learned what it meant to worry about money. “Here, hold him. Hold your grandson.”

Her mother’s hands shook as she took Ben into her arms. Immediately, her face softened with wonder.

She looked to her husband. “Richard, come here. He’s perfect. He looks so much like you.”

Her father had been standing stiff and alone in the background. There was an aloofness in his manner, and Leah anticipated his refusing the request… but then her mother knew him well. She had said exactly the right words, and Ben did look much like his grandfather. Almost in spite of himself, Richard Carrollton had to come forward to see if it was true.

“He’s so little,” he murmured.

“He’s only two days old,” Leah explained.

“Yes, but he looks exactly like my Julian and William. Can you not see the resemblance, Richard? It’s in the nose and the chin.”

Her father took a step back. “He looks too much like Huxhold,” he replied tightly.

Leah glanced at her mother with the unspoken question. Her mother met her gaze with an unwavering one of her own, and Leah knew the answer. Her father did not know about Draycutt. He assumed Leah had run away with Devon, it was he who had fathered her baby.

She rose to her feet. “Devon is my husband,” she said formally. “I ask you to accept our marriage.”

“How could you?” he asked. “Especially after what he did to Julian?”

Before she could answer, the door opened. Devon’s keen gaze went from Leah to his son and to her father’s angry stance.

“I grew worried when you didn’t call me in,” he explained, inviting himself into the room. He signaled the footman to shut the door.

After a wary glance at Leah’s father, Devon crossed to her mother. “I’m Devon Marshall. We haven’t met before.” He offered his hand to help her up.

Her mother accepted the offering, rising gracefully to her feet. She ignored her husband’s fuming silence and said quietly, “I welcome you to my family.”

That was more than her father could take. He took an angry step forward, his fists clenched. Frightened, Leah grabbed his arm. “Papa!”

Devon turned. “It’s all right, Leah. Your father should express what he is thinking. I don’t want any secrets amongst us.”

“No secrets? Well then know this, I would have chosen any man but you,” her father ground out.

“What happened between Leah and myself was not a matter of choice,” Devon said.

“No, it was a matter of revenge!”

“Papa!”

“How could you, Leah?” her father demanded, the words bursting out of him as if he could no longer hold them back. “He crippled your brother. He has disgraced us all.”

Leah stood between her father and her husband. She sensed her mother calmly watching, waiting for what decision she would make. “Papa, Julian challenged Devon, but the duel was no affair of honor. He would not accept Devon’s apology and attempted to murder him. I am sorry Julian can no longer use his hand, but I will not be an excuse for him to hate. As for disgrace, Devon is my husband. I feel no disgrace in that.”

Devon came to her side, his hand resting on her waist. Her father noticed his action and he looked to his wife.

For a moment, Leah expected him to charge out of the room. His honor had suffered so much over the years, and here was yet another blow. She wanted to embrace him, to weep with him as she had with her mother—but theirs had been a different relationship.

Then her father said, “What is the child’s name?”

“Benjamin,” Leah replied weakly, fearing the name would add fuel to her father’s temper.

“Benjamin Marshall,” Devon corrected proudly.

Her parents exchanged glances, her mother’s expression pleading, her father’s rigid. A silent exchange passed between them. Then, slowly, her father’s stance softened. He faced Devon. “I would have chosen any other man but you.”

“I am aware of that, sir.”

Her father was about to reply, when the door opened.

“Wills, I said—” Devon started, and then further words died in his throat as two footmen carried Lord Kirkeby into the room in a sedan chair. Dr. Partridge hovered anxiously behind them.

Leah hadn’t seen the marquess since the night before, and she was surprised by his robust color. His glow of health was highlighted by his red velvet jacket and breeches. He wore a matching red fez atop his head. The impact was startling and somehow intimidating.

Her father straightened like a soldier coming to attention.

“Carrollton,” Lord Kirkeby barked in a raspy voice. “Mrs. Carrollton.” He nodded at Wills. “Bring in those trays the footmen have lined up.” He explained to Leah’s parents, “Huxhold ordered refreshments, and the servants have been waiting. I hope you don’t mind. I could do with a bite of something myself.”

Her mother stepped gracefully to fill in the stunned silence. “It is good to see you, Lord Kirkeby. I hear you’ve not been well.”

“My great-grandson is the best tonic a man can have.” He motioned toward Ben with one finger. “What do you think of him? Is he not a fine, healthy baby?”

He’d directed the question almost defiantly toward her father, but it was her mother who answered.

“Yes, he is. A beautiful child.”

“He is the image of a Carrollton,” her father added.

“With the Marshall good looks,” her mother enjoined, daring to defy her husband for peace.

Lord Kirkeby gifted her with a crooked grin. “You are a clever woman, madame. Like your daughter. It is hard to believe that a petite thing like Leah could produce such a good-sized boy.” He chuckled at his own small joke. The servants finished laying out trays of buns, cheese, fruit and small cakes. “Eat, eat,”