by Madelyn Hill
Declan startled when Finn spoke. “Why did you release him?”
“A document proclaiming your father’s innocence was conveniently sent to the House of Lords. We never found out who sent them. We did not want any further trouble and Ettenborough’s daughter needed a husband. So to Ireland you went.” He rummaged in his desk.
“So to Ireland I went,” he whispered. How they’d played God with his life. And how he couldn’t absorb all he was learning. “Why hasn’t my mother contacted me?”
Broderick sighed and laced his fingers over his rotund stomach. “Fear, lad. She believes you will never forgive her.”
Would he? He had no idea. “I need to leave.”
“Wait,” Broderick called after them. “There is more.”
How could there possibly be more to tell? He stilled in the doorway and turned toward the man. “Go on.”
“The third crest is Wrights.” He looked to the window as if loathe to continue. “It is also your mother’s crest.”
Declan shook his head and Finn released a low whistle. “So Wright won her hand.”
The man flushed. “It is not as scandalous as that, Forrester.”
A smile appeared before he could stop it. So, Broderick was still enamored with his mother and would defend her to the end it appeared.
“Lillian had no protection, money, or choice, and Wright was widowed and in need of a wife.”
“I’ll be back,” he promised as he turned on his heel and left Broderick’s home without a backward glance.
“Your mother?”
“Aye.” Declan paced to the window, anger and frustration boiling just beneath the surface.
“Declan?”
He turned to his betrothed.
Tears shimmered in her eyes, making them a deep brown reminded him of Ireland, the rich soil in which he loved to toil. Maybe they should return and all this business with his mother could stay buried in London. Nay, he had to know all, and Martine’s sympathy made the anger fester deeper within him.
“You must go to her,” she prodded.
Surprised at the vehemence in her voice, he shook his head, tore away from her. “Nay. She left me with him. And then she knew I was in prison and did nothing.”
“Pah, Declan. She’s your mother, ‘tis the truth of it.”
A cool shiver went through his veins as he thought about his mother.
“Do you know what I’d do to see my mother once again? How can you throw this chance away?” she said with tears layered in her tone. “I have left my family to be here. You have the opportunity to reunite with your mother—your mother!” Tears trailed down her face unchecked.
He moved to reach out to touch her. His arms fell to his side. Bollocks. How did he explain the years of distress, loneliness? If his mother truly loved him, nothing would have stopped her from seeing him.
“’Tis selfish of you to ignore a new beginning.” Resentment flashed in her eyes as she fisted her hands at her waist. “What I wouldn’t give for one more moment with my mother.”
“Your parents died,” he snapped, trying not to let her beauty sway him. The way her tipped up chin challenged him was beguiling. “My mother chose to stay away. Don’t ignore that difference.”
Her stance softened and she nodded after a moment. Her chin lowered and her gaze softened. He gripped her hand just to feel the strength of her.
“Aye, but you must go see her.” She moved toward him and placed her hand on his chest over his heart. “For this, for us, for you.”
He looked at her, heard the pleading in her voice, but he wouldn’t do as she asked. His mother had rejected him, pretended to be dead, and allowed him to spend five years in prison. There was no forgiveness for such a heinous crime.
He left her in their chamber and went to the study. He locked the door and went to the desk to reread the letters in the trunk.
She didn’t know what he’d endured. Truly, to have both of your parents turn on you ‘twas unthinkable, yet it had happened to him.
He gave up on the papers and tossed them on the desk. They corroborated everything Broderick had said. His father had ranted about the unjust king incessantly. They warned him in decree after decree. Yet his father ignored them.
It was no longer a puzzle, he assumed. His father was a coward who wouldn’t have survived prison. His mother was disloyal to the family—to him.
His life had been unfair. Hell on earth.
He looked at the portrait of his mother, ran a finger along her face. A face he’d memorized, revered—and now loathed. Grabbing the picture, he threw it across the room. Books toppled. A clock crashed to the floor.
Why didn’t he feel any peace? He knew what had sent him to prison. The whys and hows and whos. But the soul-drenching peace he expected evaded him.
“Declan.”
He turned toward the door. Toward the only thing that mattered.
She raced into his embrace.
“I’m sorry, my love,” he whispered into her hair, hugging her close.
“I am too.”
He pulled back and smoothed her hair from her face. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
She smiled and she’d never looked lovelier. “Aye, I shouldn’t have pressed you to see your mother.”
He released her and pulled her over to the chair before the desk. He leaned on the desk, facing her.
“You are right. I should see her, put the demons behind me—us.” Declan crossed his arms before his chest. “Then we can marry.”
Her eyes brightened with flashes of brown and golden hues. “I thought you were never going to marry me.”
“Why?”
She shrugged and her skin pinkened as she shifted her gaze. “I thought you were ashamed of me.”
Cad. He was a cad. Declan knelt before her, tipped up her chin. “Never.”
Her eyes darkened as if she didn’t believe him. “You never say my surname.”
He narrowed his gaze. “What?”
“Petrulengo. You never introduce me as Martine Petrulengo. Only as Martine.”
Thinking back to the times he’d introduced her, Declan realized what she said was true. “I don’t know why. Maybe I was worried there may be animosity against your clan.”
She tipped her head at him. “I can understand, but even if there is, I am still a Petrulengo.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?” He lifted her up and pulled her onto his lap. She shifted closer to him, tucked into his lap. Warm, soft—and all his. “I am in awe of your strength. You have endured so much and yet here you are in London, away from those you love.”
She tangled her fingers in his chest hair, tickling along his skin. “’Tis nothing compared to what you have endured.” She nibbled his ear.
He kissed her brow, fierce love prompting him to say, “I am proud of you. Proud to call you my betrothed. And I will be doubly proud to call you my wife.”
A knock resounded on the door.
“Enter,” he called without moving an inch. Damn anyone who dare criticize how he and his betrothed conducted themselves.
Little cleared his throat. “M’lord, ‘tis a guest.”
Martine scrambled from his lap, fluffed her skirt, and sent a quelling look in his direction. God, he couldn’t get enough of her. Her gown smoothed over her curves, allowing him a view of her beautiful breasts. Her tsk made him chuckle.
“Aye, Little, send them in.”
He cleared his throat again. “M’lord, I believe you would be more comfortable in the parlor.”
He mentally rolled his eyes. Honestly, he’d be more comfortable in bed with Martine. In fact, all he could think of was heading upstairs and delving into her. He wanted her flesh against his. He wanted to feel h
er love as she wrapped her legs around him.
Martine nodded toward Little. “Aye, please escort the guest to the front parlor.”
“Hmmm. Aren’t you the queen of the castle,” he teased his betrothed.
She swatted at him, but he could tell she was pleased. “’Tis child’s play.”
He offered her his arm and they headed toward the parlor and the unexpected guest. Just being this close to her had him itching to run past Little, up the stairs, and into their bed. “Shall we make a run for it?”
“Poor Little would be scandalized,” she countered with a sensual smile. “No matter how much I’d love to.”
“Perhaps later.”
“Aye,” she said with a wiggle of her brow.
They laughed as the entered the grand room. He stopped in his tracks.
The mantel clock ticked.
A carriage rambled by.
His breath caught in his throat.
On the overstuffed settee near the fireplace sat his mother.
She stood. Tears glistened in her eyes. “My son,” she cried as she walked toward him, her hands outstretched as if he’d clasp them and all would be well.
“Mother,” he rasped, uncertain what to say or do. He glanced at Martine and then Little, but neither offered any help at the moment.
She let her hands fall, pain etched tightly on her features. She’d aged, he noticed, but then who wouldn’t after so many years.
After a moment of regard, she turned toward Martine. “I’m Lady Lillian Wright.”
“My betrothed, Martine Petrulengo.”
Martine squeezed his hand as his mother gasped in surprise.
“You’re betrothed?” She smiled and looked at him adoringly.
“Aye.”
He felt Martine looking at him, imploring him to be kind. But, bollocks, he felt anything but kind.
He had suffered. He had the physical and emotional scars to prove it.
“Sit,” Martine said. “We’ll have tea.”
His mother’s gaze shifted between them and she nodded.
Little brought tea and quickly left the parlor, closing the doors as he did so.
“My son,” Lillian Wright said. “How many years have I waited to say that? There is nothing . . . nothing I can do to make amends for the past.”
Fist clenched, he looked directly at her. “Aye, you are correct.” Ice ran through his veins as he looked at her. As far as he was concerned, she was a woman who’d come to visit him, not his mother.
The light shining through the windows highlighted the tight lines pinched around his mother’s eyes. Tears raced down her wrinkled cheeks. “Not a day has gone by that I have not thought of you.”
He smirked.
“I speak the truth,” she said as she walked toward him. Her fingers grazed his cheek as she looked at him greedily. “You have changed so much.”
He shrugged. “Aye, that can happen after twenty years.”
She sobbed, making him feel wretched no matter how detached he tried to be. “Your father. He was crazed. I had to leave. He had—”
“Tea?” Martine asked as she handed his mother a cup. “Certainly we won’t settle all of this over afternoon tea. But let’s try to be civil.”
His mother granted Martine a smile. How he wanted to yell at her, force her to leave. “Thank you, my dear.”
He cocked a brow and asked, “If father was such a horrid man, why did you leave me with him?”
The teacup clattered. She set it down. “You wouldn’t leave.”
“Nay,” he shouted as he stood. “You left, but he told me you died.”
She gasped as she brought her hand to her mouth. “He didn’t give you the letters?”
He fisted his hands at his waist. She spoke nonsense. “What are you talking about woman?”
“Declan,” Martine chastised as she gripped his arm. A quick squeeze and a patient look forced him to nod.
Regardless, he glared angrily at both of them. “I received no letters.”
His mother stood, worrying her napkin as she gripped and twisted the linen. “I wrote to you, begging you to come with me. But you always refused to leave your father. Each time I wrote to you, I hoped I’d see you at my doorstep.”
Dear God. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I never received your letters.”
Lilian Wright crumbled into a heap. Declan and Martine raced to her side.
“Mother,” he called as he lifted her onto the settee. “Water, get her water.”
Martine dipped a handkerchief into a pitcher of water. Declan patted her brow, an unfamiliar sentimentality overcoming him. “Mother?” he asked when her eyelids fluttered.
“Mother?”
She opened her eyes, and confusion filled her features. She touched the side of his face as if to determine if he was real or not. “What happened?”
“You fainted.”
She scoffed. “Nonsense. I have never fainted.”
He grinned despite the desire not to. “Regardless, you fainted.”
His mother ignored him. “My dear, when is the wedding?”
“The wedding?” Martine darted her gaze. “I’m not certain.”
“Not certain?” His mother sat up and patted his hand. “We will need to begin planning at once.” She pinned him with a glare. “Do tell me there is a chaperone in the house.”
“No,” Martine answered as she looked furtively between them.
She fanned herself. “No, she says.” She stood as if she hadn’t been on the floor a few moments before. “I will arrange one immediately.”
“We do not need a chaperone.”
Lillian Wright glared down her nose at him. “I will not have scandal swatted around the ton about my son and his bride to be.”
He scoffed. “I care not what society thinks.”
She gasped. “You know not what you say.”
He cocked a brow. Truly he could care less. “The letters,” he reminded her with a stern tone. “You said I wrote you back.”
A haunted look passed over her face. “Yes. I received responses to nearly every letter until four years ago. Then,” she confided, “they stopped, no matter how many times I wrote.”
He rubbed the back of his neck. His heart pounded at the news of the letters. Of the news that she’d cared. Thought upon him. Bollocks. Declan was at a loss. ‘Twas obvious his father had answered the letters. And upon his death they stopped.
Did he forgive her? Or did he continue to loathe her?
A man strode into the room, concern obvious on his face. He was tall with a regal, elegant quality that came with inherited money. The man protectively pulled his mother to him.
His mother gave a watery smile. “Robert, I’d like to introduce you to someone.”
No matter how hard he tried not to, Declan basked in the prideful look she gave him.
“Anything, darling.”
“This is my son, Lord Declan Forrester.”
Wright stepped forward. “I know who he is. I knew you would come one day.” He held out his hand and despite Declan’s desire to remain aloof, he shook it. “You know all?” His cool exterior chilled the room.
“Aye, I know all.” Did this distant man deserve the adoration his mother was bestowing upon him?
Lord Robert Wright stared at him with such scrutiny that he felt as if the man were boring into his soul. Wright nodded, then said, “I will not allow my wife to be hurt further.”
Aghast, Declan just stared at the man.
With a beseeching glance, his mother grasped her husband’s arm and tried to guide him to the door. “Robert, dear, perhaps you could allow my son and I time alone.”
Lord Wright stood rigid, uny
ielding.
“Please.”
He looked at his wife, then cast a disparaging glare in Declan’s direction. “I will see you at dinner?”
“Yes, my dear.”
He left, but not before he turned back and hesitated. His mother waved and he turned to leave.
There was more to this, Declan guessed. More than what Broderick told him, and mayhap Broderick didn’t know the details he was certain Wright had kept close.
“Until the wedding, I shall move in.”
“Nay, Mother.”
She waved at him. “I insist. Now, Martine, tell me how you met my son.”
It wasn’t his life. This was not the life he’d lived for as long as he could remember. In his life, there wasn’t a mother and fiancée discussing wedding plans.
Nay, his life was filled with pain and uncertainty. He tried to shake off the feeling that his life was still in a precarious position. No matter that his mother was here, that she’d written to him all along. No matter that Martine was his and would soon be his wife.
“I must be on my way,” his mother announced unexpectedly. “I will ready my luggage and be ready to move in by the week’s end.”
With a flutter of her fingers and a quick peck on his cheek, she left.
He turned toward Martine. “What the hell just happened?”
Chapter 26