The Confessions of a Duchess (33 page)

Dexter’s expression was hard. “Well, be assured that I do not for one moment doubt Hattie’s parentage.” His tone was rough. “That at least is one honest thing between us.” Laura winced. Only that morning he had held her in his arms and shown her if not love then tenderness. Now he sounded as though he hated her.

“Since you were estranged, Charles must have known Hattie was not his child,” Dexter said. “What happened when he discovered that you were pregnant?” Laura looked at him. She did not want to tell him, did not want to rake up all the terrible things that Charles had done, but she knew she could hold nothing back from Dexter now.

“Charles came back to Cole Court from London when I was six months pregnant,” she said. “He was drunk and violent.” She swallowed convulsively. “He swore at me for carrying another man’s bastard child. He pushed me down the stairs. I fell all the way down. I remember being utterly terrified that I would lose the baby.” She clenched her fingers together tightly. “In ten years of marriage to Charles I had never thought to conceive a child and I could not bear to lose her—literally
I could not have lived
if I had lost her, Dexter. And Charles—” Her voice broke. “He stood looking down at me as I lay there and said he hoped the child was dead and then he just walked away.” She saw Dexter make an instinctive movement of shock and revulsion.

“Later,” she said, “he wrote to say that he would take Hattie away from me.” Her words were coming faster now, spilling out after so many years of restraint. “Charles threatened to denounce Hattie before he died,” she said. “He was going to take her away from me and banish me. At first he had said nothing out of pride, but as he grew more bitter and angry, so his threats became more intemperate.” She stopped and put her hands up to cover her face briefly. “I was so frightened,” she said. “Hattie was everything to me, the most precious thing in the world. I could not have borne it if—” She stopped. “And then Charles died,” she finished fiercely, “and I was
glad.
” She felt Dexter touch her arm gently. “I am sorry,” he said, “that you were left to deal with that alone.”

Laura stood still, stiff beneath his touch, her fear and misery locked deep inside her.

She wanted him to take her in his arms but she knew there was no easy absolution for her here. Dexter could not forgive her simply because Charles had been cruel and vicious to her. She had hurt him too much in excluding him from Hattie’s life and keeping the secret of her parentage for him for him to forgive her easily now.

She moved away from him and he let her go. “Thank you,” she said. “I suppose it accounts in some part for the reasons why I have been so absolutely determined to keep Hattie safe these four years past.”

“But not for why you never saw fit to tell me I was her father.” Laura’s heart plummeted. “I understand that you must be angry—” she began.

“I doubt that you do understand,” Dexter said. His tone was dangerously quiet, but Laura could see the tension in him, barely under control. “Anger does not begin to describe how I am feeling now. To discover that I am the father of your child, to know that you never intended to tell me…” He shook his head. “Well, you may have denied me the right to take responsibility for my daughter before, but you will not do so now, Laura. You will marry me. This time you will accept me.” His tone defied her to refuse him. “You will marry me for Hattie’s sake. You claim that everything that you have done has been with no thought in mind other than to protect our daughter. Well, now that I finally know about her, that is my responsibility.”

Laura put her hand up to her brow. “No! I cannot marry you when I know that you are so angry with me and cannot possibly want to offer us your protection.” Dexter came closer to her. His face was granite hard. “I am doing this for Hattie,” he said. “I will not allow her to grow up in ignorance of the fact that I am her father, particularly when she will believe that Charles Cole, a cruel, dissolute apology for a man fathered her instead.”

“But that will undo all the good I have tried to achieve,” Laura argued desperately.

“Once Hattie is in your family circle and people see the resemblance between her and some of your brothers and sisters, they are bound to talk! They will speculate that there was an affair between the two of us before Charles died and drag Hattie’s name through the mud!” She put up her hands to cover her face before letting them fall again. “Dexter, all I have tried to do from the very first is keep Hattie safe. You say you want to protect her—well, the best way that you can do that is by leaving us alone.” Dexter shook his head. “There will always be talk,” he said. “People can prove nothing. The fact is that Charles was alive when Hattie was born and there was never any suggestion that she was illegitimate. And now that he is dead you will be safer with the protection of my name than without it. I will
not
be excluded from Hattie’s life any longer, Laura.”

“But that need not mean we have to marry,” Laura said. “You could still see Hattie—

”

“And think how much conjecture that would cause,” Dexter said dryly, “when I am supposed to have no connection with her.”

Laura was silent. She could see the truth of that. She flung up her hands. “But I do not understand why you cannot simply accept things as they are! It is the way that things are done—”

“It is not the way that I do things,” Dexter said. His anger was palpable now. The air crackled with it. “I am aware that half of society has affairs and illegitimate children and everybody keeps their peace to avoid scandal. Who would know that better than I, with my family history?” His jaw set. “It is
because
I grew up in such a situation that I am absolutely determined my children will never face a similar state of affairs. I am prepared to keep the pretense of Hattie’s parentage outside the family. It is, after all, nobody’s business but ours. However, within the family Hattie will know exactly who her father is and there will be no misunderstandings and no lies. And to that end you will marry me.”

“I cannot,” Laura said. “I cannot marry you.” She turned to him. “I appreciate what you are trying to do, Dexter. I admire the sense of honor that prompts you to do what you think is best for Hattie even when you dislike me so strongly. But you need have no concern that she is unprotected. Nicholas and Mari Falconer are Hattie’s godparents and they will make sure that she will never want for anything, either materially or emotionally.

And I have plenty of other relatives such as Miles, who will help—” Dexter made a violent move toward her and she stopped abruptly. “Hattie will always lack a father,” he said, through his teeth, “and that I cannot permit.” His voice warmed into fury. “You would rather consider any other option—anyone else’s charity—

than accept me, would you not? Do you think that I will stand by and watch another man provide for
my child
when that is my duty and I am willing to undertake it?”

“That is not why I am refusing—” Laura began, but he cut her off.

“Perhaps you will reconsider when I tell you that if you do not accept me I will be the one to tell everyone that Hattie is my child and then all your subterfuge will be in vain.” The room spun. All the breath left Laura’s body. She grabbed the edge of the table for support. “So now you seek to
blackmail
me into marrying you?” she whispered.

Dexter smiled mirthlessly. “Yes. You have said that you would do anything to protect your daughter. Well, this is the price you pay for her safety. You marry me.” Laura gaped at him. “You would not do it! You are not that sort of man!”

“You mistake me,” Dexter said. His eyes flashed, dark blue and very angry. “I am exactly that sort of man. I would do that and more if that were what it took to get you to accept my proposal. I think I have made it clear that I want you and Hattie living with me, and if the only way to achieve it is to make it plain to the world that she is my daughter, then that is what I will do.”

“You pretend that you want what is best for Hattie,” Laura said, Dexter’s determination firing her anger, “and yet you threaten her and use her as a bargaining counter.”

“I only seek to protect her,” Dexter said. “You have admitted yourself that you are not close to your relatives, Laura. I want Hattie to grow up within a loving family.”

“I cannot imagine that she will be very happy when she realizes that her father has forced her mother into marrying him and they cannot bear to be near one another,” Laura said sharply. “Besides, you cannot simply appear one day and start to live with us. Hattie barely knows you!”

“I said this morning that children adapt,” Dexter said. “Hattie will get to know me quickly. With six younger siblings I have some experience of children. You can trust me.” Laura looked at him. It was true that Hattie would be more open than she was. When she had met Dexter earlier that afternoon she had accepted him without question. She was a happy little girl because, despite everything that had happened, Laura had worked hard to make sure that nothing and no one had ever threatened Hattie’s security. She would give Dexter her unconditional love and Dexter, Laura knew instinctively, would never betray his daughter’s love and trust. Laura’s heart ached to think of the happiness such a relationship would bring them both. Dexter would make a wonderful father. But the price was that he would also be a husband,
her
husband. He would be a husband who would always hate her for her deception. But if the al ternative was for Dexter to reveal the truth about Hattie’s parentage to the world, what choice did she have? Bitter pain twisted within her.

“Very well,” she said. “I will marry you for Hattie’s sake.” The knife twisted within her again. “And I will accept the money Henry and my brother are offering as a dowry for your family’s sake. But it will be a marriage in name only, Dexter. It must be. You are marrying me because you wish to be Hattie’s father, not my husband.” She stopped. An unsettling smile had touched Dexter’s mouth. “My dear Laura,” he said, “you delude yourself. I wish to be your husband in every way there is. How could we possibly have a marriage in name only?”

“Because we don’t like each other,” Laura snapped. It was only partly true. She hated the way in which Dexter had forced her hand but she could not deny that her traitorous body responded to him even when her mind knew how impossible it was for them to be together.

There was a dangerous glint in Dexter’s eyes as he pushed away from the wall and came toward her. “I thought we agreed only last night in your library just how much we liked each other?”

“I am talking about trust and respect, not lust,” Laura said. “Those are the qualities that you yourself said you required in marriage. You feel none of those things for me.” Dexter did not contradict her. That unsettling smile still lingered on his lips. “Those qualities may be desirable but they are not precisely necessary for an intimate relationship,” he murmured.

“So cynical.” Laura looked at him, feeling a hopeless mixture of awareness and despair. “I cannot make love with you when I know how much you dislike me.” Dexter shook his head. “I am sure that you can. I still want you and that is all that matters.”

He slid a hand onto the nape of her neck and drew her forward until he could kiss her. His lips were cool and firm, almost gentle, except that there was now no tenderness in him for her. Nevertheless she felt the flare of heat within her body and was helpless to part her lips in response to the demand of his. When he let her go they were both breathing fast and there was the glitter of desire in his eyes.

“You see,” he said, in the same cold tone, “you do not require trust and esteem and respect from me. I will get a special license and we will wed within a fortnight.”

IT WAS LAURA’S WEDDING DAY
, the autumn sun was shining and the gossip in Fortune’s Folly was positively deafening. The
on dit
was all about how the Dowager Duchess of Cole was marrying Mr. Dexter Anstruther at scandalously short notice and with a special license.

Laura knew that half of the village were suggesting that she had been having an
affaire
with Dexter and was pregnant. The other half thought he was just a handsome fortune hunter and Laura a rather embarrassingly foolish older woman who had fallen for his charms. Both pieces of scandal, Laura thought, were close enough to the truth to make her uncomfortable.

Sir Montague had been so cock-a-hoop that the Dames’ Tax had apparently driven its key opponent into marriage that he had had the temerity to approach Dexter and suggest that as he was benefiting directly from the tax he should pay Sir Monty a percentage of Laura’s dowry. Dexter had declined the tempting invitation but that had barely dented Sir Monty’s glee. If Laura had not been feeling so wretchedly uncertain about her future she thought she would probably have devised another plan to take him down a few pegs, just for Alice and Elizabeth’s sakes. If the chance ever arose, she thought, she would return to the fray and help them vanquish the greedy baronet.

She stood before the mirror in her wedding dress. She had not had a new gown made for the occasion. She had not had the time. Instead she had chosen a very beautiful but very old dress that she had not worn since the early days of her marriage to Charles. It was of deep rose-pink silk, embroidered with tiny paler pink rosebuds. It swathed her tightly—she was more rounded than when she had first worn it as a girl of twenty—but the close fit of the silk was by no means unflattering. Fashions had altered, of course, but then Laura had never really cared about that. What was important about this dress was that she had worn it when she was happy, before the canker of Charles’s neglect and indifference had eaten away at her and changed her life. It was as though putting the gown on today was a pledge of faith, a desperate hope that she would find with Dexter the happiness that she longed for.

Even so, she experienced a moment of utter panic as she stood staring at her reflection. How could she go through with this sham of a wedding? Dexter did not care for her. It was Hattie he wanted. He certainly did not love Laura the way that she loved him.