Chapter 21
Heathbrook sat in his carriage outside Yates’s town house as his footman inquired whether Yates would see him. What was he doing here? What did he hope to accomplish by challenging Mother’s cousin?
An end to this struggle, hopefully. Or at least an end to his fears that Zack might pay for it one day.
The footman came back to the carriage. “The servant says the master will see you, my lord.”
Moments later, Heathbrook was being ushered into Yates’s study to beard the lion in his den. If he was even a lion.
Yates rose from the chair behind his desk, concern clearly written on his face. “How are the boys? No one’s hurt or—”
“They’re all fine,” Heathbrook said. “They’re actually thriving.”
Except for Zack. He couldn’t think about that right now or he’d fall apart.
Yates eyed him cautiously. “Then why are you here?”
“Lily came to see me.”
The older man got shaky all of a sudden and dropped into his seat. He glanced at the footman still standing by the door, waiting for Yates to either dismiss him or command him. “Please call for tea for us, John. And perhaps some brown bread with butter.”
Heathbrook resisted the urge to ask if they had any apple cake. He didn’t want to further alarm Yates. The same reason kept him from asking for something stronger than tea.
“You were saying?” Yates said. “Mrs. Pritchard came to see you?”
“Yes. She informed me of something I did not happen to know—that Zachary is my son. Imagine my surprise when I heard that you have known it all along but didn’t bother to inform me of it.”
Yates paled. “That is what your parents preferred.”
“Then someone should have told Lily. She was shocked to hear that I didn’t know. She thought my mother had already informed me of it.”
“Of course she did,” Yates said wearily. “Mrs. Pritchard has a tendency to hear only what she wants to hear.”
“I’ve noticed that about her,” Heathbrook grumbled.
“During our elopement, when I told her we should stop for dinner in York, she took that to mean we should take a room and go about the business of consummating the marriage we hadn’t yet had.
And having seen what she looked like back then, you can probably imagine how eager I was to comply. ”
Yates’s expression hardened. “So, you blame her and not yourself for what happened between you.”
“Oh, no, I blame myself more than anyone. I knew the rules and chose to ignore them. What’s more, I should have seen through her scheming.
But at the risk of repeating myself, I was sixteen at the time, younger than Kit is now.
So, I didn’t see her clearly, or we wouldn’t be here having this conversation. ”
“And why exactly are you here, Lord Heathbrook?” his cousin asked coldly. “What do you hope to accomplish?”
“First, answer my questions. I need to know why you have been so determined to fight me for custody, even of my own son. Did Mother convince you I was a roué, who could never learn to behave himself and would make a terrible parent? Did Father? Did Lily? What made you decide I wasn’t worthy of the information that Lily had borne me a child? ”
At that moment, a maid came in with the tea and a plate of brown bread and butter, with a couple of pickles on the side. Apparently, the boys hadn’t lied about Yates’s fondness for pickles.
After the maid poured the tea, Heathbrook took the cup she offered him but waved away the bread and pickles. He was in no mood to eat just now, even though he’d had little nourishment on his way to London.
As she headed back to the door, Yates said, “We do not wish to be disturbed, Mary.”
The girl nodded and left.
“Well?” Heathbrook asked, growing impatient. “Let’s start with the most pertinent question—why not tell me the truth about Zachary?”
Yates sighed, and sipped his tea. “Your father sent me a strongly worded letter saying you were running after every light-skirt in Paris and under no circumstances was I or your mother ever to let Lily tell you about Zachary.”
The pain of that unexpected betrayal hit Heathbrook surprisingly hard. “What the hell? Father lied! I didn’t start running after light-skirts again until Lily broke my heart with that damned letter about Pritchard. Even then I only did it to infuriate my father.”
“I confess that your mother and I did wonder about your father’s claims. Your letters to Lily, which she kept and showed us, were romantic and poetic.
The thought of you penning them while at the same time running after light-skirts was monstrous and showed you to be more untrustworthy than either of us had previously considered you to be.
Especially since you had deflowered the chit and had clearly planned to marry her. ”
A picture was starting to emerge that made Heathbrook wonder just how much his father had to answer for. Granted, Lily had been at fault, too, but still . . . “So, that is why you fought me for custody? Because of what my father said?”
“And because you’d been a bit of a wild lad before.”
“Yet you didn’t use my past with Lily against me in court. Why not?”
“Then everyone would have known Zack was a bastard. I could never do that to him. Or ruin Lily’s life, either, since she is married now, with children.”
A picture of Yates was also beginning to emerge, and it little resembled the one Heathbrook had formed of him.
Yates stared down at his desk. “About that letter from Lily to you—I should probably tell you that your mother basically dictated it to her, although to be fair, Lily was happy to go along with it.”
“Because she saw the writing on the wall. Much better than I had ever done, at any rate. But why would Mother—”
“She could think of no other way to keep you from continuing to pine after Lily—or do something disastrous like attempt to return to England alone. I know it probably doesn’t look that way right now, but your father had been trying to save you and so had your mother.”
Odd how Giselle had said almost exactly the same thing.
“He knew you had a mind of your own and could act unpredictably.” Yates grimaced. “Unfortunately, neither of them revealed to me the truth of everything. So, I assumed you were still every bit as reckless as your parents thought.”
“That’s why you took me to court over custody.”
He nodded. “At first I was surprised you even wanted custody. I figured you meant to continue your whoring in London. But after my investigators couldn’t find any actual mistresses for you since your return, I began to wonder.
Especially since they also couldn’t find any evidence of malfeasance in your management of your father’s estates. ”
“Yet you took me to court.”
“I . . . er . . . wanted to see how you behaved. If your lawyer had tried to explain away your actions as youthful indiscretions, I would have felt surer of my opinions. But I was impressed by his logical assessment of the situation and his evidence about your character beyond your relationship with women. And afterward, when my investigators told me your new fiancée was practically a saint—helping détenus when she was in France and taking care of her aged mother, not to mention being befriended by Falconridge’s perfectly respectable wife and sister—I began to question your father’s dictate even more. ”
“Thank you for admitting that,” Heathbrook said, now feeling faintly guilty that he’d lied to Yates about Giselle being his fiancée.
On the other hand, it wasn’t a lie anymore, so there was no reason to tell Yates the truth now, was there?
“And in appreciation of your revealing the truth to me, I will admit that my investigators couldn’t find any evidence you were trying to siphon money from the boys’ inheritance. ”
Yates jumped to his feet. “You thought I was stealing from them?”
“I couldn’t imagine any other reason you’d have for wanting custody.”
Marching over to a bookshelf, Yates took down a stack of ledgers, then walked over to drop them at Heathbrook’s feet.
“Here, see for yourself! I have not taken one penny from those lads. Your father allotted a certain portion of their properties to supporting them, but beyond that, the income from said properties has all been detailed down to the last farthing and deposited in individual bank accounts for the day when each of them reaches his majority.”
When Heathbrook stared down at the stack of ledgers in astonishment, Yates added, “Look them over. Take your time. I’ll wait.”
“Relax, Yates,” Heathbrook said. “I’m not here to accuse you of theft.”
“Aren’t you?” Yates snapped, crossing his arms over his chest.
“No. I’m here to get at the truth. Don’t you think it’s time that we do so, instead of relying on a basket of assumptions we have no evidence to support?”
Yates stared down at him, then softened imperceptibly. “Probably. Yes.” He walked back to sit down behind his desk. “But you should take those anyway, to peruse. I have copies.”
“Of course you do,” Heathbrook said. “I would have done the same if I’d been you. You see? We are more alike than you realize.”
“Yet I did not impregnate any young ladies without marrying them,” Yates pointed out.
“You did not impregnate any young ladies at all. Nor have you ever married. I could have used that against you if I’d wanted, pointing out that a bachelor couldn’t possibly know how to raise three young men. But I try not to fault a man for having a different personality than I do.”
“As you say, we are quite different. I am not good with people, I’m afraid.” Yates stared past him at the door. “Still, will you tell me—do the lads . . . miss me?”