Chapter 20
Giselle waited a long while before leaving Heath’s study.
Fortunately, everyone in the house was consumed with making sure he was ready to leave for London, so she was able to go upstairs unnoticed and make sure no signs of their lovemaking remained on her attire.
It would not do for her to join the boys for dinner looking like Heath’s mistress rather than his fiancée.
She sat down on her bed, brushing away tears. His fiancée. At last he wanted her as his wife. Then he had gone and ruined it by telling her he could not love her. Could she be a mere wife to him when she loved him so very much?
After all, he had run away to avoid her love. There was no doubt in her mind he was doing exactly that. Her talk of love had scared him off, and though she thought she knew why, it did not change anything.
How could she have fallen in love with the rogue, anyway? He was so . . . so irritating.
And handsome and seductive and clever, with a boyish charm that somehow made him endearing. Oh, she was such a fool.
She brightened. Perhaps if she married him and gave him enough time, he would come to love her. But what if he never did? What if he merely continued to take her for granted as Papa had done with Maman, while he went about doing what he pleased?
She could not live that way, no. Of that, she was certain. With a sigh, she went down to dinner.
The rest of the evening passed far too slowly. First, she had to explain to the boys that Heath had been forced to return to London briefly on business. Then she had to explain—without telling them the truth—why Zack insisted on remaining in his room.
Thankfully, she persuaded them that Zack had overheard Heath arguing with her over his trip to London and had grown upset. Now, she must somehow convince Zack to keep quiet about Heath being his father, at least until Heath returned home and could talk to the boy himself.
Once that was done, she had to talk to Maman. But she could not bring herself to do so. Maman seemed so happy that Giselle’s and Heath’s betrothal was continuing after all that Giselle did not have the heart to disappoint her with the truth.
By the time the boys and Maman had retired for the evening, Giselle was exhausted by all her evasions, not to mention the outright lies she had been forced to tell. She did not like lying. And if she did agree to marry Heath, she would make him swear not to force her to lie for him ever again.
Before she could retire, however, she had to check on Zack. She knocked on his door, but he did not answer. Fortunately, when she turned the knob, she found the door unlocked.
And there he was, fast asleep, still wearing his clothes.
She sighed. How difficult this must be for him.
She remembered only too well how hard it had been for her, and she had been old enough to understand that her parents had never had a good marriage.
But Zack knew that his “parents” had loved each other, so to lose them suddenly . . .
The poor, sweet lad.
Careful not to wake him, she undressed him and put him in his nightshirt, then tucked him in under the covers.
She could not help looking for signs of resemblance to his real papa.
And they were there, to be sure, although anyone else would see those as signs of how much the brothers resembled each other.
She choked back tears. Leaving Zack—and Evan and Kit— would be almost as hard as leaving Heath.
No, she must not think about that. She had to protect her heart. And if that meant leaving, then so be it. With a shake of her head, she went down the hall to her bedroom and fell into bed.
The next morning, she was rudely awakened by Evan and Kit barging into her bedchamber. She jerked the covers up to her chin. “You cannot come in here!”
“Zack is gone!” Kit cried. “We’ve looked everywhere for him.”
Her heart sank.
“He was not in his room when we arose,” Evan added, “and we can’t find him in the house. He must have been very upset about your argument with Heath, indeed.”
Oh, no, this was a disaster. “Leave the room so I can dress,” she ordered them. “I shall meet you downstairs in ten minutes.”
Not bothering to put on a corset, she threw a redingote on over her nightdress, donned stockings and a pair of sturdy shoes, grabbed Heath’s note to Zack, and hastened down to meet the boys.
“Did he leave any indication of where he was going?” she asked them.
“Nothing,” Evan said.
“And he didn’t even ask for food from Cook,” Kit said, “although the footmen did say someone took a couple of slices of apple cake out of the breakfast room.”
She raised an eyebrow at them.
“Of course it was Zack,” Evan said with a roll of his eyes. “We figured that much out. But where could he have gone?”
“Here is what we should do,” she said. “You two should take horses and go to the farthest ends of the estate and work back this way, checking all his favorite spots. I will start on this end and look around the gardens, then check the tower.”
“Surely he wouldn’t be stupid enough to go back up there,” Kit said. “Heath gave him quite the lecture the other day about how dangerous it was. He even threatened to withhold apple cake from him if he persisted.”
“It’s Zack,” Evan said. “He doesn’t think like you and I, Kit. You know that.”
Because he is Heath’s son. He thinks like his reckless father, who nearly pulled off an escape from Verdun’s notorious Citadel. Who dealt with his imprisonment in Bitche by learning to fight, the stubborn fool.
“We’ll find Zack,” she said firmly. “Now go mount up and check the rest of the estate, and I’ll check the tower.”
She was nearly certain that was where Zack had gone. It would be just like him to rebel against Heath by doing the one thing his father had forbidden him to do. But if the boys went to the tower with her, they might spook him.
Hurrying through the gardens, she scanned them in passing, but the closer she got to the tower, the more she thought she could make out a figure at the top, leaning on the railing and looking over the edge.
With her heart in her throat, she practically ran up the stone stairs. And of course, there at the edge of the wooden deck was Zachary. He had to have seen her coming, yet he had stayed at the railing.
Not sure what to make of that, she ventured out onto the tower observation deck.
Heath had been right about one thing—it was unsafe.
There were spots where the wood was worn clean through, and other places where whole boards were rotted away.
Stepping carefully, she made her way to where Zachary stared out over the estate, probably watching his brothers—his uncles—searching for him on horseback.
When she came up beside the lad, she had to resist the urge to jerk him back from the railing. No sudden movements, she warned herself. It’s a long way down, and if he should fall through the railing . . .
She shuddered. “Zack, mon ange,” she said softly, “are you all right?”
He did not even start at the sound of her voice. “What does mon ange mean?”
“My angel.”
“I’m not an angel. I’m a bastard.” He practically spat the word. “How do you say ‘bastard’ in French?”
“Batard.” She debated a moment, knowing that what she was about to do was monumental. But somehow she knew it was right. “I’m a batarde, too, you know, although I prefer to use the term ‘natural child’ myself.”
“No, you are not. Your mother is here, and your father died in France, and they were married to each other. Even I know that.”
“That is not the whole truth. My mother married a man who was not my father. Before that, she became pregnant by my real father, who was not her husband. So, yes, I am a natural child every bit as much as you, although nobody knows because Maman had a husband by the time she gave birth to me.”
He looked at her then. His eyes were red from crying, and apple cake crumbs dusted his shirt and waistcoat. “When did you find out about your real father?”
“When I was eighteen. It was hard to hear the truth.”
He nodded. “I don’t like that Lily woman.”
“Neither do I.”
He scowled. “I don’t want her to be my mother.”
She chose her words carefully. “The woman you knew as your mother chose you to be her son, even though you were really her grandson. She did that out of love, because you were so special to her and because your real father was in France against his will. And your real mother, Lily, agreed to the countess’s scheme out of love, too. ”
She reached up to stroke his hair, as straight and thick as Heath’s.
“They did not want you to live the life of a bastard. People can be very cruel about children born or conceived out of wedlock. So, if you want Lady Heathbrook to be your mother, then you can choose her to be your mother. Lily will understand. She wanted that for you, after all. That is one of the nice things about being a natural child. I got to choose the father I liked best, and you can choose the mother you like best, as long as you do not tell anyone that you’re a—”
“Batard,” he said woefully.
“Natural child,” she corrected him gently. “Through no fault of your own.”
He seemed to consider that a moment. “Do my brothers know?”
“No one, not even Maman, knows. Just you, me, Heath, and Lily. And your late grandparents, of course.”
“And Lily’s parents?”
“Yes.” She winced. “I suppose a few people know.”
“And Cousin Yates.”
She sighed. “Apparently so. And Heath and I just found out ourselves. It came as a great shock to both of us. But I assure you, Heath is delighted to have you be his son.”
“He ran away to avoid being around me,” he grumbled.
He ran away because he is afraid to love me. No, she could hardly tell the lad that. “He did not run away. He went to confirm everything with Cousin Yates. Only so that Heath will know how to make matters easiest for you. And he left this for me to give you.”