On our wing of the house, it is only our chambers, a few sitting rooms, a music room, and a smaller library. The nursery is on the east wing, and I’ve seen you standing in that room looking forlorn. I suspect you want to be closer to the child, so let us share my exceptionally large room and our baby will only be a connecting door away. Very unconventional, I know, but are we not the masters of our home? I daresay we can do whatever we want.
Phoebe flung her arms around his neck, hugged him tightly, and squeezed. She eased back, cupped his jaw tenderly, and pressed a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Thank you!”
Before she could lean back, he turned his head so their lips were a mere whisper apart. He had such extraordinary eyes—cobalt with a fleck of sapphire. And in that beautiful stare, there was a faint glimpse of humor in his eyes and arousal so profound she blushed. Despite using every excuse under the sun to ravish her lips so often, he showed the most admirable restraint in not seducing her further.
“I have been here six weeks now,” she said, brushing a curl from his forehead.
He did not object to her tender ministration but leaned even further into her touch. She went frightfully warm inside. Each day they grew closer, but there was still a reserve in his gaze at times, as if he were a watcher of their interactions and not a participant.
It had made her feel odd, and she had been incredibly careful to maintain a facade of propriety, which he had smashed earlier with his request for her to be unrestrained. Now she wanted the same from him. That he was honorable and kind was a given, but there was so much more that felt unreachable to her. Phoebe wanted to know him even if he would never allow himself to love her. But that is quite fine, she staunchly reminded herself. I shall not love him, either. This is simply a business arrangement and a friendship.
Pushing aside the heaviness suddenly pressing against her chest, she asked, “How…how does marrying me benefit you?”
His eyes became hooded, piercing, and watchful, like a hawk. Unexpectedly, her heart jerked. “Hugh…will you tell me?”
He gently clasped her hips and urged her back against the cushions and the tree trunk. The position was comfortable given the paddings of cushion and blanket beneath her.
He shifted on the blankets, sitting by her feet so they could see each other clearly. The entire affair was far more serious than she had supposed. There was a flatness about his lips and a distance in his eyes that had not been present earlier.
“What is it?”
His eyes held her for long moments, then he signed, “I am a bastard.”
She took a quick breath of utter astonishment. Then the shock of discovery hit her full force, and she pressed a palm over her heart. “I beg your pardon?”
“I am not my father’s child. My mother had an affair, and I am the product of it.”
Her lips parted, and she took a few breaths before she said, “You are not a bastard. Please do not refer to yourself as such. While your father might have been someone else, the earl claimed you as his child.” She rested a hand on her high mound protectively. “Just as how my child is legitimate because of our marriage.”
A glint of something undefinable moved in his gaze. “The ton will not see it as such.”
“They will not have a choice.” Then she recalled the paintings in the hallway and that Caroline and the other little boy in the picture looked nothing like the earl, either. A heavy suspicion lodged in her heart, and he watched her with flat eyes, surely waiting for her to arrive at the inevitable conclusion.
A deeper understanding of why he wanted an influential family to connect with his settled inside her. Dear God. She stared at him, horror icing through her. If the ton was aware of this, or even speculated upon his legitimacy and caused a scandal, the duke and duchess would not stand in support.
“Hugh,” she whispered achingly, considerably dismayed. He had given her so much, and not even in that regard would she be able to be there for him. “You will have my full support and loyalty in every way.”
She owed him that even if society would dare to try and cut them because of old rumors and scandals. Phoebe squeezed his fingers. “I will be there in every way. If they try to cut you or Caroline or all of us, I shall certainly not spare them my indifference or anger.”
His mouth hitched in a fleeting smile. “I know that much about you. It is one of the reasons I married you.”
A warm feeling suffused her entire body. “But my parents, they are the ones with the power to shape society’s opinions to their will. The duke and duchess…they are deplorably proper. They…I…”
“When needed, your father will provide his support.”
Phoebe was stunned. “It is useless to think that he would!”
“I will be able to compel him to do so.”
She wavered, trying to comprehend his certainty. “How could you possibly do that?”
A touch of a smile curved his lips, and the hint of ruthlessness to it faltered her speech. She watched his fingers and expression carefully as he signed.
“Many of the investments your father is deeply entrenched in, the Winthrops own the controlling interest. If the duke’s support is required in any manner, he would have little choice but to give it.”
A lesson her father had always impressed upon his children was recalled to her mind. Within the ton, those with money and a title are the most powerful. A position the duke himself immensely enjoyed. If that money was threatened even a bit, his admirable position would be endangered. Her thoughts whirled. “My father partakes in investments where you own the controlling interest?”
Hugh’s fingers moved. “Several.”
“But you did not know we would be married,” she said, a bit of confusion twisting through her.
He signed slowly, and she watched his expression and fingers keenly.
“The earl and I have planned my return these last few years as if we would head into battle. The most powerful and influential families of the ton have been studied, secrets, scandals, financial weaknesses and strengths collected. The value of marrying any one of their daughters is incalculable. When you fell into my hands, I daresay we were beyond fortunate.”
She arched a brow as a spurt of amusement caught her off-guard. “Fell into your hands? How odiously ominous. But I do understand now…I am the doorway needed to reach my family and many other powerful connections in the ton.”
A piercing disquiet filled her, and she tried to push it away. It was the power of her connections why his father had not protested their match. She was still amazed Hugh had married her given he must have possessed other choices. Phoebe realized then a part of her wished there had been something inside of him that had reacted to her as a woman…something in him that wanted her without the connections more than anything else.