Highland Sinner (40 page)
Authors: Hannah Howell
Tags: #Conversion is important., #convert, #conversion
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that he was ready to welcome the cold oblivion of the grave.
“Edgar and I think you should play dead for a while,” said Leopold. “Aside from us, the only one who knows you are alive is the man who attacked you. He will very soon be too far away to tell anyone the truth.”
“Your servants—”
“Will keep the secret.” Leopold smiled faintly at Julian’s look of doubt. “You must accept my word on that, m’lord. Our family and our cousins the Vaughns have servants whose loyalty and silence is absolute.”
“Something many would pay a fortune for. So, I remain dead. Do I hide here then?”
“Do you trust
your
servants to be silent?”
“Not all of them, no.” Julian sighed. “I still do not understand how you became involved in this mess.”
“We have been involved from the beginning, m’lord,” said Chloe. “From the night your wife gave birth—
”
“To 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 only 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 mis-heard 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.”
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“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 Kenton—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.
About the Author
Hannah Howell is an award-winning author who lives with her family in Massachusetts. She is the author of twenty-nine Zebra historical romances and is currently working on a new historical romance,
If He’s
Wicked
, coming in June 2009! Hannah loves hearing from readers and you may visit her Web site:
www.hannahhowell.com
.
ZEBRA BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
850 Third Avenue
New York, NY 10022
Copyright © 2008 by Hannah Howell
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
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