“No doubt things are a great deal simpler where you come from. If families like mine took such a lax attitude to this sort of disgrace, it would be an open invitation for unscrupulous rogues to seduce their way into our ranks. No unwed lady of quality would be safe from their odious attentions.”
This time it was Hadrian’s step that faltered. “Are you saying my brother bedded your sister against her will?”
“Not strictly against her will, perhaps, but certainly against her discretion and the wishes of her family.” Her outraged tone warned Hadrian she would never permit wanton passion to lure her from the narrow path of propriety.
“You said Julian put your sister in her grave. Did she die in childbed, then?” Hadrian’s throat tightened. “If you hold him responsible for that, many a loving husband must bear the blame for his wife’s death.”
“My sister survived the birth, though it was difficult and certainly weakened her.” Lady Artemis kept her eyes fixed upon the house, clearly eager to reach the sanctuary of its imposing walls. “She died eight months later, her spirit broken by the consciousness of how her innocent folly had brought shame upon our family and led to our brother’s death.”
Hadrian stifled a troublesome spark of sympathy for the dead girl. “So you admit it was her fault and not my brother’s.”
Lady Artemis cast him a sidelong glance of scathing contempt. “If you had any finer feelings, you might understand that people may bear an undeserved sense of responsibility, even when they are not to blame.”
The last thing Hadrian expected was for her offensive words to bring him an unaccountable rush of relief. No doubt it was the last thing she intended. “If my brother’s child is such a scandalous stain on your family’s reputation, I cannot understand why you refuse to give him up.”
Lady Artemis practically ran the last few steps to the gatehouse. Once beneath its stone archway, she turned to skewer Hadrian with a challenging glare. “He is all I have left, Mr. Northmore. I cannot expect you to understand how that feels. I will not give him to you to ruin his character with too much money and too little attention.”
Her accusation knocked the wind out of Hadrian. She was completely wrong about him not knowing the devastation of such a loss.
Perhaps sensing her advantage, Lady Artemis pressed on. “For his sake, go away and leave us in peace.”
Without waiting for an answer, she stalked off into the courtyard. The child stirred then and opened his eyes. Spotting Hadrian, he reached a small hand over his aunt’s shoulder toward his uncle.
“I am not going anywhere!” Hadrian bellowed after Lady Artemis. “I will do whatever it takes to get my nephew!”
Chapter Three
“Hush, dearest!” Half an hour after her confrontation with Mr. Northmore, Artemis had still not succeeded in quieting her nephew.
She’d tried feeding him, changing his linen, bouncing him in her aching arms until she feared they would be wrenched out of their sockets. Nothing had worked. After a year of caring for Lee day and night, Artemis recognized the difference between a hungry cry, a weary cry or an injured cry. This was one she had not heard often—a wail of bloody-minded vexation.
“Hush!” she begged him again, practically driven to tears herself. “This won’t endear you to Uncle Henry. He may toss us both out tonight and have done with it.”
She would give anything for an hour’s peace to review her limited options and decide what to do next. The sudden appearance of Hadrian Northmore had made an already desperate situation far worse. Despite her brave boast about never letting him have Lee, Artemis feared she might soon have no choice.
Even if she’d been willing to entrust Lee to one of Bramberley’s tenants, Mr. Northmore could easily bribe such people to give him the child. If she defied Uncle Henry’s orders and got them expelled from Bramberley, she had no money to provide for her nephew. Even if she could find work as a governess or companion to some ailing dowager, she would never be permitted to keep a child with her. Which would place her right back where she’d started.
Heaving a dispirited sigh, Artemis sank onto the nearest chair and took her nephew’s weight onto her knees. For a moment his cries quieted. Then he inhaled several deep, wet breaths and began to howl again.
“You must get your temper from the Northmores.” Artemis struggled to wipe his dribbling nose with her handkerchief. “Your eyes, too. They are the very same shade of gray as his.”
That should have not come as a surprise, but somehow it did—this intimate connection between the child she loved and the man she loathed. Was it possible Lee sensed it, too?
“You would go with him in a trice, wouldn’t you, ungrateful little creature? What would become of you then?” What would become of him? She’d been so preoccupied with venting months of pent-up frustration upon Hadrian Northmore, she had never bothered to enquire about his plans for the boy.
Now that she’d purged some of those dangerously intense feelings, Artemis found herself able to view the situation more objectively. Was it possible her interests and Mr. Northmore’s might not run altogether contrary? After all, they had one important thing in common—they both wanted Lee when no one else seemed to.
“I vowed I would do anything to keep you.” Artemis cuddled the crying child close and drizzled kisses over his tear-streaked little face. “And Mr. Northmore threatened to do anything to get you. Perhaps we need to find out just how far each of us is willing to go.”
Lee seemed to endorse her idea. Or perhaps he was only responding to her kisses and calmer tone of voice. His cries lapsed into a series of sniffling hiccoughs. Artemis rubbed his back while she talked through her plans.
“I cannot let Mr. Northmore know how desperate our situation is. I am certain he is the kind of man who would not scruple to exploit an adversary’s weakness. So I must act quickly, before he discovers mine.”
Summoned to the inn’s back parlor, Hadrian paused on the threshold. “Why, Lady Artemis, this is a surprise.”
Not only was he astonished that she’d sought him out after their hostile exchange the day before, she scarcely looked like the same woman he’d happened upon while scouting out Bramberley. If it had not been for her haughty manner and formal way of speaking, he might have mistaken her for a nursemaid taking his nephew for an outing in the fresh spring air.
Today she looked every inch the daughter of a marquis, from the toes of her kid slippers to the crown of her chip hat. A footman in full livery lurked beside the door. This was what Hadrian had pictured when Ford first mentioned Lady Artemis Dearing.
She acknowledged his greeting with a cool half smile. “Perhaps now you will understand how I felt when you appeared out of the blue yesterday, Mr. Northmore. After we parted, I had an opportunity to reflect upon our conversation and repent my incivility. I have come to apologize for any offense I may have given.”
Her speech was a model of polished courtesy, expressing all the proper sentiments. Hadrian did not believe a word of it. Given a choice, he would far rather receive pithy insults from the lady’s pretty lips than insincere apologies.
What had brought her here, then, if not genuine regret
