Chapter 2
Sebastian stilled, the very breath in him suspended. Then a chill struck clean through his chest like a blade. “I beg your pardon. What did you say?”
Silence tightened the room as the girls stared at him, rigid with fright.
The only sounds were the soft tick of the mantel clock and the whisper of rain against the windows.
The girls continued to look at Sebastian, plainly frightened and uncertain.
Then he noted their gazes. Two of the girls had eyes a deep, arresting blue, his very shade, and a small cleft at the youngest chin was his father’s echo.
Shock hammered through him. He took one step forward and halted. Across from him, Miss Whitley rose, her fingers twining so tightly her knuckles blanched.
“Your father—” she began.
“No.” The word cut the air like a heated blade. Anger and disbelief surged swiftly and hotly. “My father would never betray my mother and our family in such a manner, and certainly not for so long, Miss Whitley.”
Sympathy and something else unknown gleamed in her gaze. “He… I am afraid it is true.”
A rough laugh escaped Sebastian. He had never taken a married woman to his bed, nor would he keep a mistress already engaged elsewhere, or a lover who had an attachment.
Such honorable guidance was learned at his father’s knee, and this woman would have him believe they were his father’s illegitimate issue.
Was the very honour his father taught him a falsehood?
“How old are you?” he demanded, his voice low. “How old are they?”
“I am one-and-twenty,” Miss Whitley said, scarcely above a whisper. “Emelia is sixteen, Jane is thirteen, and Sarah is eleven.”
He inhaled, sharp and painful. One-and-twenty. The youngest eleven. This did not suggest a lapse; it suggested a life. Was his father a bigamist, or was their mother a kept mistress?
Four children.
Sebastian’s stomach turned. Thank God, his mother and younger sister have been settled in Bath for the past couple of weeks, not in town.
Even a breath of this would gut his mother and shatter his sister.
Many men of fortune and rank kept mistresses; yet his parents, by every account, had loved honestly, respected one another’s sensibilities, and guarded their vows.
To think otherwise set his teeth on edge.
A hollowness opened beneath Sebastian’s ribs.
Had he known his father at all? The man he had admired above all men, whose counsel he still carried into the Lords when he rose to speak on relief, on trade, on the duties of a nobleman toward those in his care.
The voice he had tried to emulate in committee rooms and on the floor might be the voice of a hypocrite.
The thought struck like cold iron, and he gripped the edge of his desk to steady himself.
“My lord—”
“I have heard quite enough, Miss Whitley. In the morning, you will break your fast and then quit my house.”
Her face drained of color. The youngest flinched at his tone, and the middle two pressed closer as if seeking shelter from their oldest sister.
“Please, my lord, allow me to explain all that I know of this matter. Perhaps then, you—”
“I am not interested in hearing more,” Sebastian said, cold as winter. He would not allow anything to harm his mother and sister. “If you insist, you will leave tonight.”
Tears sprang bright in Miss Whitley’s bright golden-brown eyes, her lips trembled, and she whispered, “Please.”
The single syllable carried an ache that seemed to echo in the spaces between them.
It was filled with fear and desperation.
Sebastian’s jaw flexed. He could not endure the sight of those girls shrinking into themselves, nor could he stomach turning them out into the street at such a late hour on a wet night.
Yet he would not—could not—allow one breath of scandal to touch his mother, his sister and his family’s legacy.
“We have nowhere to go,” Miss Whitley said quietly. “That is the reason I took the risk to travel to London with my sisters. Your father… he is our father, too. He cared for us as he could, and then he died, and Mama… Mama could not endure—”
“Be silent,” he snapped. “I do not care about your blasted lives!”
She flinched. The youngest gave a soft, wounded sob. Miss Whitley glanced at the girls and drew them closer with trembling hands.
“Our mother died two years later after… after your father,” she managed, seemingly steadied by will alone. “As the eldest, I did my best to care for my sisters. I had no choice but to seek you out… for help, my lord.”
“For what, precisely?” His tone cut like ice.
“What help? Did you believe I would throw wide my arms to strangers and call them kin? That I should welcome those kept from me all my life? That I would open my home and my arms to those hidden like a foul scandal. For all I know, you may be a resourceful impostor seeking to fasten claims upon my family.”
A single tear traced her cheek. “I am sorry,” she said hoarsely. “I was as shocked to learn you existed as you are to see us. I did not understand that the connection between our parents was not… respectable. We are alone, without family or funds, and I did not know what to do.”
Not respectable. So her mother had been a mistress.
Sebastian’s fist curled at his side until his glove creaked.
How could his father have lived in any fashion that allowed this woman to believe there had been a proper marriage between her mother and his father?
That suggested family dinners and celebrations.
That implied his father had been a constant presence in their lives.
How in God’s name had his father lived a double life for so many years, and with such success that his own son had not known.
The more Sebastian considered it, the more disbelief rose in him, and with it suspicion. They were charlatans. That must be it.
“You claim a connection to my father. If there is any truth in what you have said, you will present it—names, dates, every particular, and anything you possess that may be called proof.”
“I have some measure of proof,” she said quickly.
A harsh sound escaped Sebastian. “Only a measure. Do you think I am a fool, Miss Whitley ? Only a measure will not do.”
Miss Whitley reached into her pocket with a visibly shaking hand and drew out several envelopes, wrapped in brown paper and tied with a frayed ribbon.
She moved toward him. The ribbon rasped softly as she offered the bundle.
His temper surged anew, recalling the awareness he’d felt at the tilt of her mouth and the lush curves of her figure.
For my damn sister! If this is true… bloody hell.
He ruthlessly shoved the memory aside and took the packet regardless. The paper lay cool against his palm, faintly scented of dust and lavender. Sebastian drew a long breath and banked the fire that leaped in his chest.
“I will allow you to stay the night.”
Visible relief swept through them. “Thank you, my lord,” Miss Whitley said. “We—”
“You will not use that word in this house,” he said quietly. “Sisters.”
The youngest’s eyes filled with tears. He looked away before the resemblance could work upon him further, then fixed the eldest with a hard gaze.
“You will also refrain from speaking to anyone outside this room about the purpose of your visit. If one whisper of your tale escapes the servants’ hall and reaches society, and above all, my mother’s ear, I will see you crushed. Do you understand me?”
Miss Whitley nodded, tears held fiercely at bay, but her mouth trembled when she replied, “Yes, my lord.”
He rang for Gerald. When the butler appeared, carefully impassive, Sebastian said, “There shall be no discourse among the servants regarding my guests. No one is to speak of their arrival, and no one is to speculate upon it. You will not repeat that Miss Whitley styled themselves as family. Do you understand?”
“Yes, my lord,” Gerald said, and bowed.
“And Gerald,” he added, still watching her, “have Peabody attend me first thing in the morning.”
“Very good, my lord.” Gerald withdrew.
Sebastian held her gaze as he continued, “Tomorrow at ten, you will come to my study and give me a detailed account of your lives, and you will answer every question put to you. If I determine your tale is false, you will depart my house at once. If it proves true,”—he stopped, his throat tightening on words he could not yet shape—“then we shall speak of what is to be done.”
Miss Whitley inclined her head. “Thank you, my lord.”
“Do not thank me,” he said with bare civility. “Thank the rain.”
She nodded and ushered her sisters away.
The youngest cast him a last, searching glance.
In profile, the cleft at her chin looked more pronounced; his heart gave a betrayed thud.
When the door closed behind them, the room felt too large and too quiet.
He stood a long moment, the rain whispering at the panes, the clock marking out seconds he wished he could reclaim.
Sebastian went to his private study, set his shoes by the hearth, and flung his jacket across a chair. His cravat hung loose at his throat. Rain whispered against the tall windowpanes, and the fire burned low and steady, a dull glow along the grate. Leather and old paper scented the room.
All the letters bore his father’s seal. The wax had long since been broken, yet the signet’s impression remained clear.
The hand was unmistakable, the same measured strokes he had seen upon ledgers and a hundred notes.
Sebastian chose one of the later letters.
The paper had softened at the folds, the edges furred where fingers had worried them, as if the message had been read until it learned the reader’s touch. His throat burned as he read.
My dearest Mary,
The weather has played the tyrant with the post, and only this morning did your letter reach my hands.
I wish I could be with my family this Christmas day, to see our girls around the hearth.
I miss Emelia with her sensible smile, Jane with her quick curiosity, and dear Darcy, whose care so sweetly steadies the younger two.
Pray tell me the parcels pleased them. I long to picture their faces when the ribbons were loosed, and each treasure made its appearance.
I fancied Jane would lay immediate claim to the pencils, while Emelia would divide the comfits with judicial fairness and then scold Darcy for pretending she wanted none.
You chide me unjustly when you suppose I am disappointed for want of a son.
I am perfectly satisfied, more than satisfied, to be blessed with daughters only.
God be praised, our newest little one has come safely into the world.
If it please you, grant me the honor of calling her Sarah, for her grandmother.
The name has long lived in my thoughts; should we be blessed again with a girl, and I should count it a privilege to bestow it upon our child.
I am grieved beyond measure to have missed the hour of your giving birth.
Forgive me for not being by your side. I miss you more than is seemly to confess, and I loathe that business keeps me so long from our little household.
The cares of town and the duties of the earldom are obligations only; my true comfort is with you in the quiet of the country, where the evenings fall gently, and the girls’ laughter makes a music no London concert can rival.
Take care of your strength. Sit by the fire when the wind rises, take broth, and let the nurse carry Sarah to you only when you are rested.
Send to me at once for anything you lack.
I will contrive it, however tiresome the town may prove.
Kiss each girl for me and tell them their papa thinks of them every hour and keeps them in his prayers.
Ever your devoted,
James
Sebastian read the lines again and again.
I wish I could be with my family on this Christmas day.
I miss you more than is seemly to confess, and I loathe that business keeps me so long from our little household.
The words struck like ice. In his father’s sentences, London and the earldom, his mother, sister and himself, were reduced to business, while the hidden household in the country was the real and cherished family.
Cold and bitterness spread in Sebastian’s chest until even the fire in the room offered no warmth.
He set the letter upon the desk with care, as if gentleness might undo what he had learned.
Why do I feel this heaviness upon my chest?
The rain kept up its soft assault upon the glass; the longcase clock ticked with maddening civility.
Sebastian pushed from the desk and strode into the hall, taking the curve of the staircase two at a time.
He was a fool for having allowed them even a night.
He owed them nothing. He did not know them, and he did not wish to.
Servants gossiped; London lived upon whispers and scandal; a single careless word could ride the first post to Bath and find its way into a morning scandal sheet.
His mother’s heart had broken once already when his father died, and she had not yet recovered.
He would not permit anything that might break it again.
How had his father contrived such a life? The man whose steadiness he had sought to imitate in every vote and speech had written of another hearth as home. Had duty been a mask worn with perfect ease. Had affection been so divisible? The questions pressed until Sebastian’s chest ached.
He reached the eldest girl’s door and opened it without knocking, careless of courtesy.
Sebastian halted halfway to the bed. All four lay asleep together, curled about the eldest as if she were the tree that kept them rooted and safe.
He stood for a long moment, then turned away, uncomprehending the impulse that had driven him up the stairs.
It felt as if he needed to fight and rail, to loosen words and fury in a manner unbefitting an earl.
With a harsh breath, he left the chamber and walked to the east wing. In his own chamber, he crossed to the bed and let himself fall upon it. Sleep kept its distance for a long while before, at last, darkness closed over him.