Tomorrow was her birthday, they were to spend it with her parents and open early Christmas gifts together. Alec's was to be a special gift, something he would have never expected. It was a pair of baby booties that she had originally knitted for Melody's baby, but had decided instead to use them to surprise him.
"Bastard!" she hissed as she ran up the stairs.
It was only last week that she had finally figured out why she had felt so tired in the evenings. Counting back the days to her last monthly, she had realized that her courses last came, at the end of August. That was two weeks before they were married. The nausea that she had been experiencing for the past weeks made perfect sense to her now. She was pregnant, and married to a man who did not want children!
Slamming the door to her bedroom, Serena locked it and threw herself across their bed. It was only then that she let the tears flow.
The sound of his bedroom door crashing clued Alec into the fact he would be bunking alone tonight.
"I made some liver and kidney pie, should I bring you some?" Mrs. Wyatt spoke from the darkness. She had obviously been hanging on their every word.
"No, thank you Mrs. Wyatt."
"That's right. I forgot you weren't partial to having any guts are you?" She said before turning on her heel and leaving him to sulk alone.
Alec sighed. Marriage was hell. It was the hardest damn thing that Alec had ever stumbled blindly into. He contemplated the craziness that was the last two months of his life. Sure it had started off all kisses and good things like groping in the dark, lovemaking in the afternoons when Mrs. Wyatt and his mother were out shopping for supplies, but there was a dark side to marriage as well. Such as, having to figure out the moods of the woman you had just committed the rest of your life to.
Serena had like fifteen different moods in as many hours of the day! One minute she would be laughing, the next she would be in tears. Just yesterday evening, he had innocently suggested that she get fitted for new gowns, as hers were becoming a bit snug in the bust area and she had come unglued.
"Your turn to deal," George Sinclair tapped his son in law on the shoulder to gain his attention. "Quit your brooding and get to it."
"Sorry," Alec mumbled and shot his wife an irritated glance as she walked by carrying empty plates from their dinner into the kitchen. It was her fault that he was in such a sour mood. The woman just couldn't be happy with the way things were between them, she had to keep pushing at him for more.
Today was her birthday, and he had a special present waiting for her at home. He hoped it would improve her mood. All day she had sent him withering looks, and he was getting plain tired of it.
"I think it is best if we call it a night George." Alec said quietly.
"Ah, I understand. Got something planned for my girl, do you?" George smiled with a twinkle in his eye.
"I have something for you and Charlotte as well. Open it after we are gone, will you?" Alec handed the plain flat box to George and stood. "Sorry it is not wrapped. Mrs. Wyatt usually does that for me, but apparently we are not on speaking terms."
"Son, I would be worried if I was you," George chuckled. "If Evelyn Wyatt is silent, then you've got hell to pay."
"Words spoken in anger are rarely forgotten"
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
"I am starving. I cannot understand why you wanted to leave before we had a chance to have dessert. My mother's Christmas cake is a tradition," Serena grouched. She began rummaging through the kitchen for something to snack on.
"Ha!" Grabbing a pickle from the jar in the pantry, Serena munched on it as Alec wrinkled his nose in distaste.
"You are actually eating one of those foul things? Out of all the foods that Mrs. Wyatt cooks, those are the worst of the lot." He shuddered as she took an even bigger bite.
"These pickles are heavenly. You just don't know how to appreciate anything anyone does for you," Serena said waving the half eaten pickle in his direction.
"I appreciate Mrs. Wyatt," Alec denied hotly.
"Humph," Serena snorted as she grabbed another pickle from the jar. Turning the lid she replaced it in the pantry and turned to walk into the dining room. Christmas would be in a few hours, and she wanted to give Alec his present now, while they were alone.
"I have something for you," Serena said quietly as she walked to the sideboard. Opening the cupboard, she pulled out a tiny silk wrapped box. "For you," she said with a smile.
"What is it?" Alex asked bemused. "I left your present on our bed upstairs."
"Open it and see for yourself."
Taking the box from her he gently pulled apart the bow, and pried off the lid. What he found inside confused him. He shot a look from the bundle of yarn to the woman standing in front of him.
Walking over to him, Serena lifted the tiny pieces from the box and held them up to the light. She watched as the semblance of her gift dawned on him. The box fell from his grip to the floor and his jaw tightened.
"You're pregnant?"
"Yes. I thought you would be a bit happier about the news, but I must have thought wrong." Serena said in a near whisper.
"I told you how I felt about children," Alec snapped before he thought the better of it. Fear clenched his gut as he took in the small bits of yarn that she held in her palm.
"I did not make this baby alone Alec," Serena informed him with a snippy tone, and forced the booties into his hand. "It is not like I can return it either, so you had best get yourself used to the idea of being called papa!"
"I can't deal with this right now..." Picking the box up off the ground, he placed the tiny scraps inside and replaced the lid all without looking her in the eye.
"Deal with it? Is that how you think of me? Am I something you just have to deal with?" Serena cried out as he stalked past her and headed for his study.
"Where are you going? We are not done with this conversation," she made a grab for his arm but he shrugged her off. "Tell me what is wrong," Serena demanded as Alec kicked the door to his office open, and stalked over to the liquor cabinet. Picking up a bottle, Alec did not bother to find a glass, he drank straight from it.
"Go to bed Serena," he snarled at her.
"Why, so you can hide yourself in this bottle? Don't think that I don't notice whenever things get too rough, you drown it all out with spirits," Serena snapped. She was hurt by his insensitivity toward her.
"Just go. Get as far away from me as you can," Alec ordered her, taking another gulp from the bottle at his side. "I want to drink heavily, and it's best you not be here right now."
"Don't do this Alec. Whatever it is... we can face it together. Just tell me what you have been hiding from me, and I can help you. I love you."
"Help me?" he laughed gutturally. "No one can help with this."
"At least let me try," Serena begged.
"Why can't you see that I cannot give you what you want?" Turning away from his wife, Alec slammed his fist into the wall. "Serena, I cannot give you what you need right now. Just go on up to bed."
"Why? Why, can't you let yourself be happy?" Latching onto his arm, Serena fought back tears.
"Just let it be." Shrugging off her grip, Alec faced her once again. "Go."
"You owe me an explanation if nothing else." She longed to cry out 'you owe our baby an explanation,' but kept herself silent. She would not beg him to accept her pregnancy, and in that moment she knew she could not bring herself to walk away without knowing what was so wrong with her, that he could not accept what she had offered him.
"I realize you are not happy that I'm with child, but I did not think you would resent it either."
"It is not the baby! I just... I do not have time to talk about this right now, damn you," Alec roared, his patience gone.
"Why? Just tell me why and I will leave you alone. I will never expect you to help me raise this baby. You can go your way, I will go mine. This marriage was based on a stupid mistake anyway," Serena's voice cracked on that last part.
It
was hard to admit it, but she had to face facts. They would need to figure out a way to live their lives in a world that was both together and apart. Maybe she should just go and live with her aunt Lilith in Illinois? Serena was determined that she not be a burden on Alec nor her parents ever again. At least at her Aunt Lilith's, Serena could help run her Uncle's apothecary and barber shop. Maybe she could do their books as well? She really was exceptionally good with numbers.
"Please," she begged and hated herself for it.
"Do you know what would happen to me when I was a kid if I laughed? If I cried... or hell if I even squirmed in my seat?" Alec ran a hand over his chest as if trying to ease the ache that started there. The tightness was back. The feeling as if he were choking on bile surfaced once again.
"No, I..."
"The old man would beat the hell out of me, that's what. I was not allowed to play. I wasn't allowed to run...nothing. Every damn day, he found some reason to beat me. Do you know what it is like living wondering if you were going to make it until the next morning?"
"Oh, Alec."
"Let me say it, all right? You wanted to know, so now I will explain it the best way that I can." Alec interrupted, any trace of sympathy from Serena and he knew that he would crack right in two. "Once, I must have been about nine, the bastard took a hot fire place poker to me. It wasn't the first time he had beat me with objects, but it was the first time that he nearly killed me."
"Oh Alec," Serena gasped.
Alec laughed harshly, the sound hollow. "I can still remember the maids crying as they dressed the wounds on my back, the way they tried to keep from showing their own fear of the old man. He stood in the doorway watching, telling them that if I died they were going to get the same."
"Why didn't they help you?" Serena whispered aghast.
"They were afraid he would throw them back into whatever slum they had crawled out of." Lifting the hem of his shirt, Alec pulled it over his head and tossed it to the ground. "The wounds were infected, and the skin healed badly. All of this because I got muddy playing with a neighbor's new puppy. Don't you see? I cannot trust myself with a family. With the rage that I feel inside, I cannot risk it. And you, Serena... you deserve better than that. "
For years, he had tried to hide the marks that he carried from the women he bedded, but Serena was different. He had always come to her in darkness so that she would not ask him questions. He knew she had felt them during intimate moments, but whenever he thought that she would try to investigate further, he distracted her. If she tried to touch his back, he would usually pin her hands to the bed or place them on his ass. He knew she had been curious, but Serena had respected him enough not to ask.
"Look at them." Face averted, Alec pivoted slightly to allow Serena full access to his scars. "This is why I did not want to marry and why I refused to have children. This is why I am too broken to be any good for you."
He knew just what she was seeing. Four thick, puckered, dark patches of skin ran crisscross downward from his shoulders. The skin surrounding the marks was dead to the touch, and even after twenty years Alec knew they were still just as ugly. Thankfully, they were not as large as they were when he was a child, but they were still large enough to serve as a reminder after all of these years. A reminder, that evil tainted his bloodlines.
"Dear God," the rasp came, not from the woman he held in his arms, but from the doorway. Bethany stood holding her stomach. Her face was so pale that Alec feared she might faint.
"Bethany..." Alec stooped to pick up the shirt and struggled in his haste to don the garment. He did not want this woman... this interloper to see his scars. Somehow it felt almost dirty to have her look upon them, and he was ashamed now that she knew his secret.
"No wonder you hate me... All these years I never knew," she cried.
Crossing the room to her son, Bethany wrapped her arms around him. She did not care that he stood stiff, detached. No emotion showed on his face, but she needed this connection. She needed to hold the son she had lost so many years ago. "I thought that you would be safer with your grandfather. For the first two years after I had been captured my only thought was to return to you. I fought my slavery every day. One day, the tribe that killed your father and captured me, traded me to another." One shaking hand dared to reach up and cup Alec's face. "The warriors brought me as a gift to their leader."
"Hunter's father," Alec stated through clenched teeth. Hunter had explained to him some of what his mother had experienced in her life as a captive. He had told Alec all about the early years of their family life.
"Yes, Hunter's father. I feared him at first. Those first two years had been filled with torture and unspeakable acts, so I thought they would just repeat. I even found a way to stab their chief with a blade that I had found. I thought for sure I was to die. Then I was given a gift, the gift of his love and respect. I was married to a good man, one whom I came to love very much."
"Good for you Bethany, I am glad you found some happiness."
Stepping away from her embrace, Alec walked toward Serena who stood frozen watching as he was flayed open by Bethany's confession. "I'm glad that things worked out so fucking well for you." Alec muttered bitterly.
He waited for Serena to scold him for his choice of words, but the rebuke never came. His wife just stood there. Great fat tears fell from her cheeks as she silently watched as his mother nearly begged him to understand the choices she had made. He felt foolish and raw all at the same time. It was stupid to stand here wishing for things that could never be.
Alec longed to run from the room and hide as he did so many times as a child. Instead, he masked his pain and chose to pretend that nothing Bethany had said mattered to him. He wanted to pretend that he could not care less about the past, and that child that grew inside of his wife was a happy event, but the fear of the responsibility weighed on him. The fear of one day hurting his child scared him shitless. He worried that he would become that monster that had raised him.
"You two need to talk. I am going to bed. Good night," Serena said quietly without emotion as she backed out of the room.
"Good night dear," Bethany squeezed Serena's hand as she passed her, but Alec stayed silent. He could not speak past the lump in his throat. He watched as his wife dejectedly slipped from the room. He had wanted to call her back, but maybe it was for the best that she left him right now. He would make it up to her when he went to bed. In the only way that he knew how to show her that he needed her, he would give her all he had there.
"Do not let my mistakes that I made with you keep you from building a family. I did not mean to, but I overheard your argument in the dining room. What you said hurt that girl, son."
"I did not mean it," Alec sighed. "It is not that I don't want the baby, I just cannot trust that I will be a good father for it."
"Oh son, that is horse shit!" Bethany snapped angrily much to Alec's shock. His eyes widened at the woman before him. "You tell me one reason why you feel you cannot be a good father."
"I have a terrible temper," Alec confessed.
"So do I, so does Serena. It won't be the same with you as it was for your grandfather. Here, sit." Grasping Alec by his hands, Bethany pulled him into a pair of chairs that sat facing each other. She sat, but refused to let go of his hands.
"Bethany, maybe you should not get involved in this. Our fight is between the two of us," Alec said quietly.
"You are my son, when you hurt it is my job to fix it." Bethany smiled sadly at the man sitting before her. "I am going to tell you the entire truth. It is time that you understand just how things came to be."
In her mind's eye, he was that precocious three year old pouting because he could not go with his parents on their journey to the western coast. Alec had wanted to see the wild men that his grandfather had warned his papa about. She could see him sitting there plain as day in his little trousers and coat that his grandfather insisted he wear at all times in his household. Secretly, Bethany had always sn
uck her boy out in old play clothes so that they could make mud pies together or collect rocks. She loved to take him to do normal boy things that her husband and father- in- law never allowed.
"I was fifteen when I married your father. Stanley was nearly fifteen years my senior. I came from a poor household, and had gone to work in the Wentworth's mansion to help support my mother and baby sister." Bethany began her story. It was one that she probably should have told him long ago. There were so many things that she should have done, and she was ashamed by it, she had failed this boy. She had failed her baby.
"I have an aunt?" Alec asked interested.
"Had my love. She and my mother both died the year before I married your father. I was alone in the world. All of a sudden this handsome man wanted me. It angered your grandfather when Stanley Junior put his foot down and that said he was going to marry me with or without Stanley Senior present. In fact, it was the only time that I had ever seen your father have a backbone when it came to your grandfather," Bethany laughed at the memory. A happy smile rose to her lips. "It wasn't long before you were born. The happiest and scariest day of my life, I was not yet sixteen, but by that point I felt as though I had the knowledge of a woman twice my age."
"Did you love me?" Alec asked her, his expression was guarded.
"More than anything in the world. You were perfect. Hardly ever cried, never stopped smiling. I loved you dearly. I still do," she told him.
"Bethany..." she waved away what Alec was going to say, and continued her tale.
"Things got a bit rough in our marriage after your birth. It was not your fault, just a sequence of events. Your grandfather's shipping business was floundering. Your father was drinking heavily and probably draining the coffers to support his lover," Bethany's face fell at the memory.
"His lover?"
"Yes, your father had taken a lover, and in fact, she was an old friend of mine. He had set her up in a fancy house, and most nights he stayed over with her. It had hurt me deeply, but it was better than when he was home. When he was home, the beatings would start."
A Betting Bride Page 16