“Not exactly.” Papa uttered a sigh. “The poor woman didn’t really have a choice.”
Tristan was staring at her father with a hard look in his eyes. “Oh?”
Papa ignored him to focus on Zoe. “You see, my dear, when we found Drina, she was stumbling along the road toward York. We were headed in the opposite direction, but your mother . . . I mean, Agnes . . . felt sorry for her out in the snow, especially once she noticed that Drina was pregnant. So she begged me to stop and help the girl, Gypsy or no.”
He drank more water, his eyes misting over. “I could never deny Agnes anything, you know.”
“I—I know.” Zoe was still reeling from the knowledge that she hadn’t even been born when her adoptive parents met her mother. Until now, she’d assumed she’d been a babe in arms.
“We took Drina into the carriage,” Papa went on, “but we couldn’t get enough information from her to find out exactly where she was headed.” His voice held an edge. “She was in a bad way, poor woman. She’d been beaten about the head and shoulders. It must have sent her into labor, for she bore you in our carriage a short while later.”
“And then she . . . she just gave me to you? On impulse?” Zoe was trying to understand.
“No.” He clenched the cup in his fists as if bracing himself for something. “It all happened very quickly. One minute we were birthing the baby, and the next she was bleeding to death, and there wasn’t a thing we could do about it.” When Zoe caught her breath, he cast her a guilt-ridden look. “I’m sorry to tell you, dear girl, but Drina has been dead since a few moments after your birth.”
Dead. All this time. Her natural mother had died giving birth to her.
Zoe’s head swam. Drina hadn’t abandoned her. She’d died with Zoe in her arms.
Tears burned Zoe’s eyes, both for the mother she’d never known and for the one she had. Two mothers now lost to her, both loving her.
The tears fell freely, and she let them fall. She let herself mourn the mothers who’d shown their love for her in their own ways.
“Oh, my darling girl, I’m so sorry,” her father said.
“It’s all right, Papa,” she choked out, though it was far from all right.
“You still have me,” he said softly.
“And me, sweetheart.” Though Papa tensed, Tristan ignored him and handed her a handkerchief. “Are you all right?”
“I—I will be.” She dabbed at her eyes and her nose, trying to get control of her tears. “At least I kn-know that she wanted me.”
Her father laid his free hand on her shoulder. “She did want you, indeed. She spoke very little at the end, but it was all about you. She kept saying, ‘Mi babbi, mi babbi . . .’ and clutching Agnes’s hand. We asked if she had a husband and she shook her head no, but we didn’t know if she was saying she had no husband or she didn’t want her husband to have the baby.”
Zoe froze. Oh, Lord, she would have to tell Papa about Hucker. How was she going to tell him about Hucker?
“She said the phrase ‘milosh corrie’ over and over in her language,” Papa went on, “but we didn’t know what she was saying and—”
Tristan stiffened. “Milosh Corrie is . . . was . . . her brother. Drina wanted you to bring the baby to him to raise, no doubt.”
When a look of panic crossed Papa’s face, a chill swept Zoe. “You knew,” she said hoarsely. “You knew it was the name of someone in her family.”
“Not at first, I swear! A . . . A few years after you were born, I came across a Gypsy and asked him what the words meant. He said they might be a name. Might, mind you. I didn’t want to believe it.”
He cupped her cheek, and his gaze turned fierce. “Because by then you were ours. Our daughter, damn it! If this Milosh was your father, he’d beaten your poor mother to death. We weren’t giving you up to some bastard who might hurt you.”
Zoe swallowed. She could understand that.
But there was one thing she didn’t. “Why didn’t you just tell me all of this?”
“Zoe—” he began in that placating tone.
“I understand why you kept it secret when I was a girl. You didn’t want to risk my blurting it out. There was a great deal at stake, after all. I do realize that—it’s why I took great pains to hire investigators I could trust.”
As Tristan began to rub her back, she couldn’t keep the hurt from her voice. “But I asked you about it after Aunt Flo let it slip, and you lied to me. Surely I could have been trusted with the story by then.”
The weight of what she’d done by opening the investigation hit her, making her heart catch painfully in her chest. “If I’d known Drina was dead, and there would never be any danger of her returning to make trouble for us, I . . . I wouldn’t have gone off to hire the Duke’s Men. I wouldn’t have risked the title and the estate!”
When her father cradled his head in his hands with a groan, Tristan said in a cold voice, “Ah, but your father didn’t dare let the truth get out to anyone. With one slip, you would risk more than your estate and title. Because essentially he and your mother stole you, breaking a number of laws in the process. He lied in registering your birth, he bribed a government official to record you as entering the country as his child, he probably tossed your mother’s corpse into the woods to rot—”
“No!” Papa’s head shot up. With a dark frown, he jabbed his empty cup at Tristan as if it were a weapon. “We buried her, I’ll have you know. We even said a few words over her grave. There is no law against that.”
“You made no attempt to look for her family.”
“They abandoned her!” He glowered at Tristan. “Drina was alone on that road. So no, we did not go looking for the arses who’d abused the poor woman.” He stared off into space. “You can’t possibly understand what it’s like to want a child so badly—”
“An heir, you mean,” Tristan said bitterly. “That’s all that your kind cares about.”
“My kind ? You, sir, have become cynical because of your father’s ways.” Papa’s breath came in quick gasps. “Taking in Zoe had nothing to do with wanting an heir. But we could not . . . That is . . .”
“It’s all right, Papa.” Zoe covered his hands with hers as she shot Tristan a warning glance. “You don’t have to talk about it.”
“But I do. Bonnaud thinks he knows everything about our ‘kind.’ But he doesn’t know a damned thing about people. Or the meaning of sacrifice.”
He rose from the chair to face Tristan. “I was injured in the war, sir. I cannot have children. Agnes knew that, yet she married me anyway. Because she loved me. Because some things are more important to a woman than . . .” He swept his hand to encompass the bed. “Than that.”
As the color drained from Tristan’s face, Zoe realized exactly what Papa was saying. He was injured there in the war, badly enough to prevent children. And perhaps lovemaking, too?
Lord, she didn’t want to think about her parents doing that. Still, now that she’d experienced the joy of it . . . It would be horrible to be denied that union with the one she loved. And Mama had really loved Papa. There was no mistaking that.
“But Agnes wanted a baby,” Papa went on. “She never spoke of it, not once. Never uttered a word of reproof. On our return from America, however, I saw the yearning in her eyes when she was helping with a fellow passenger’s babe. So by the time we encountered Drina, I had already been pondering the possibility of our taking in a foundling.”
He ruffled Zoe’s hair. “So when Zoe appeared, we marked it as a sign. God in His mercy had dropped a child into our hands, and we intended to hold on to her, regardless of what doing so required.” He stared fiercely at Tristan. “I’d do it again if I had the chance.”
“Oh, Papa,” she said, sniffling as she rose to put her arms around him. “I’m glad that you did it, too. I’ve had a wonderful life with you and Mama.” She smiled at her aunt, who looked shattered by Papa’s revelations. “And Aunt Floria.”
Papa held her close
, burying his face in her hair. “I’m so sorry I kept it from you, dear girl. Agnes wanted me to tell you years ago, but I was too afraid. And not because I didn’t trust you.”
Holding her away, he fixed her with an aching look. “In my eyes, you were my own daughter. I didn’t want you ever to think otherwise. I didn’t want to weigh you down with the truth. And . . . well . . . I wanted you to choose your husband without your illegitimacy hanging over your head to worry you.”
She eyed him skeptically. “You wanted me to marry Jeremy.”
“I’ll admit I thought it would keep you safest. And perhaps I . . . I pushed you in that direction. But not if you didn’t want him.”
“So you’re not disappointed in me for putting my own desires above those of the estate and the family?” she asked in a small voice.
“Disappointed!” He looked genuinely shocked. “I could never be disappointed in you, my girl. I may chide you and grouse about your clothes or your manners, but that’s only the fretting of an old man concerned about his daughter’s future.”
His hands gripped her shoulders. “I don’t say the words as often as I should, but I love you. Haven’t you figured it out yet? You are my whole life!” When tears stung her eyes again, he continued in a choked voice, “And I never intended to lay such a heavy burden on you, I swear. I’ll admit that your marrying Mr. Keane would have solved a number of problems, but—”
“Well, well,” came a voice from the open door, “so the truth comes out at last.”
When Zoe looked up to find her cousin standing in the door taking in the entire family tableau, she groaned. “Oh, no.”
“Oh, yes, coz,” Jeremy said in a cynical tone. “You didn’t think you could keep the secret from me forever, did you?”
He strode into the room. “So, which problem exactly will marrying me solve? Your family’s need for money?” His gaze flicked over her in her night rail and Tristan without a coat. “Or your need for a father to claim Bonnaud’s by-blow?”
20
TRISTAN, ALREADY ON edge from Lord Olivier’s accusations, was enraged at Keane’s. But before he could vault across the room and put his fist in the man’s jaw, Zoe’s father said, “By-blow?” He glared at Tristan. “You got my girl with child, you damned arse?”
“Of course not, Papa.” Zoe laid a cautioning hand on both Tristan and her father, then stared her cousin down. “As usual, Jeremy is being overly dramatic.”
“Am I?” Keane said.
“I’d be careful if I were you, Keane,” Tristan growled. “If you continue to besmirch the character of my future wife—”
“Ah.” Keane’s gaze grew calculating. “So Lord Olivier is the one trying to force Zoe to marry me. Not you.”
“Jeremy!” Zoe snapped when her father swore and looked as if he might vault across the room. “Would you please stop inciting these two? They’ve had enough excitement for one night as it is.”
When Keane merely lifted an eyebrow, Lord Olivier marched toward the man. “And why would I want my daughter to wed a whoremonger like you? Yes, I know what you were about last night, you and this . . . this . . .”
He waved back at Tristan, and Tristan winced. His sins were tumbling onto his head like an avalanche. He only prayed they didn’t bury him.
“Bonnaud did not accompany me into the brothel,” Keane drawled, to Tristan’s surprise. “I expect he came here instead.”
When Lord Olivier bristled, Zoe released a decidedly unladylike oath. “Would you please stop that, Jeremy? Do you want to die?”
“Better than being tricked into marrying a woman who doesn’t want me,” Keane said.
“No one has been trying to trick you into anything,” Zoe said. “Papa and Aunt Floria were hopeful that we might consider marriage to each other, but I never wanted it. And I seriously doubt you ever did, either. My father and aunt are the only people who got that notion into their heads, and I have just been disabusing them of it.”
“So you’ve convinced your father that he doesn’t need my money, after all?” Keane asked snidely.
Lord Olivier stared Keane down. “I don’t need money from you, sir. Your pictures may earn well now, but they are nothing to the wealth provided by the land. It is the land that brings fortune; it is the land that—”
“You sound like my late father,” Keane said. “You may not realize this, sir, but even though you dislike my work, I’m not some pauper daubing paint onto canvas in a garret. Besides, as heir to half of my father’s wealth—”
“Half?” Zoe put in.
“My sister inherits the other half,” Keane said coldly. “We Americans divide our spoils equally, unlike you hidebound English. But as your father knows perfectly well, my half is substantial enough to support a wife and more.”
With a flush rising in his cheeks, Keane bore down on Papa. “I assumed that a need for money was the impetus for his inviting me to London several times. You don’t mean to tell me that this show of wealth hasn’t all been an elaborate scheme to hide the fact that you need my money desperately?”
Zoe let out a breath. “That’s why you kept asking about our funds? And how we could afford everything?”
“Of course.” For the first time, Keane looked uncertain of his position. “I thought that your father was hoping to persuade me into giving him a loan. But now that I think about it, your family has been throwing you at me. So a marriage makes sense, too. It would certainly plump up the family coffers.”
“You do realize that my brother-in-law is quite wealthy, don’t you?” Zoe’s aunt chimed in.
Keane crossed his arms over his chest. “Lord Olivier was just saying that marriage to Zoe would solve a number of problems. If not money problems, then what?”
That laid a pall over the room. If they told Keane the circumstances, they might as well hand the title and the estate over to him themselves.
Tristan sighed. Then again, it would be impossible to hide it much longer, now that Milosh meant to go after Hucker.
Of course, the earl didn’t know that yet.
“It doesn’t matter,” Lord Olivier said loftily. “The point is moot, now that she’s marrying Bonnaud.”
Zoe let out a breath, then flashed Tristan a smile that took him off guard. She truly wanted to marry him, even given the difficulties it meant for her future. And her father was willing to let her, too. It boggled his mind.
Bonnaud thinks he knows everything about our “kind.” But he doesn’t know a damned thing about people.
He winced. Having lived with his biases so long, he was dismayed to realize how firmly they’d been based on his own experience with George and Father . . . and not on anything—or anyone—beyond that.
“But,” Zoe said, “the point is not moot, Papa. We have to tell Jeremy what’s going on.”
Alarm lit his lordship’s face. “The hell we do! It’s a private matter. It doesn’t concern him.” To Tristan’s shock, the earl turned to him. “You must explain this to my daughter, Bonnaud.”
“I’m afraid I can’t,” Tristan said. “She’s right.”
“Not in this, she isn’t!” Lord Olivier stared meaningfully at him. “You, of all people, should understand what is at risk. Are you really going to take the chance of losing . . . everything?”
“It was never mine in the first place,” Tristan said softly. “All I want is Zoe, and I will take her any way I can get her.”
Speaking the words made them real. And true. Perhaps they’d been true for a while. All he knew was he wanted to snatch only one thing out of all the chaos: her. As his wife. None of the rest of it mattered.
Her father’s eyes narrowed on him. “You mean that.”
“Of course.” He gave a faint smile. “Do you think I’m generally so careless as to leave my horse lying about a mews for some strange groom to find?”
“Tristan,” Zoe said, “do not try to convince me that you planned this.”
“No.” His gaze locked with hers. “But I didn�
��t fight very hard to keep it from happening. Did I?”
As the truth of that hit her, a brilliant smile spread over her face. It was the most beautiful sight of his life.
Then she gazed at her father, and her smile faded. “I’m sorry, Papa, but we have to tell my cousin about Drina. He’s going to find out anyway.” She slid a furtive glance at Keane. “Milosh is determined to exact vengeance from my . . . from Drina’s lover for the beating the man administered. He only agreed to wait long enough for us to tell you the situation.”
That gave Lord Olivier pause. “Drina’s lover? You found out who he is?”
“I’m afraid so, my lord,” Tristan put in. “We . . . er . . . haven’t had the chance yet to give you our report on that particular situation.”
Keane was watching them all now like a hawk watches the prey he’s waiting to pounce upon.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t a damned thing they could do to stop that. Even if they kept everything quiet, once Milosh got to Hucker, the tale was bound to get out. Hucker would tell George, and George would try to make Tristan’s life miserable by stripping his future wife of everything she ought to own. All George would have to do was tell Keane the truth.
So it would be best if they told him first, and all the interested parties could work together to solve the issue, because they might be able to negotiate a settlement of some sort with Keane. Surely he wouldn’t want his family mired in scandal, even his English family. And if the family closed ranks, that would take the wind out of George’s sails.
Besides, the earldom still belonged to Lord Olivier, and it might be some years before it was passed on. It was never good for the present holder of the title and property to be at odds with the heir. Even Keane must realize that.
“So,” Keane said, “does someone want to explain to me what’s going on?”
“Of course.” Zoe steadied her shoulders. “But only under one condition.”
Keane tensed. “And what is that?”
“Could we please continue this discussion fully clothed? Preferably somewhere else than in my bedchamber?”
How the Scoundrel Seduces Page 22