“But how could such a thing be hidden?” he asked, unable to hide his incredulity at the request. “And why should it be?”
“Because if they know, the child will be in danger.”
The words settled heavily between them, and he finally understood. “Who is the father?”
Her lips parted, but no answer came.
“Mary.”
She turned her face away. “I cannot tell you.”
“You ask for my protection while refusing the one fact that would explain this.”
A tremor passed through her body, whether from pain or fear he could not tell. “I would tell you if I dared.”
His voice hardened. “Is the man dangerous?”
Her silence answered him better than any words ever could.
Andrew studied her more closely then and saw it plainly: terror. It was not the ordinary terror of childbirth, but something deeper. Whatever secret she carried, she feared it more than death itself.
Another pain seized her. She pressed a shaking hand against her middle and drew in a ragged breath. When it passed, tears stood in her eyes.
“Please, Your Grace,” she whispered. “Protect the child. Never say the baby is mine. Let no one know.”
He did not answer at once.
Every instinct warned him against giving his word blindly. A promise made in ignorance was dangerous. Yet she was looking at him as though he alone stood between her child and some approaching darkness.
“Very well,” he finally agreed.
Mary’s breath caught.
“You have my word,” he said quietly. “I will protect the child. And I will say nothing.”
Relief passed over her face. Her eyes closed. One trembling breath left her, as though she had set down the last burden she could carry.
Andrew stood beside the bed in the dim room, listening to the hush of the cottage, and felt the promise settle upon him with all the weight of something that could not be undone.
Chapter One
“This may be the worst thing the ton has printed yet.”
Frances Norton, the daughter of the Viscount of Keswick, lowered the scandal sheet only enough to look over its edge at her mother and sister. Morning light spilled across the drawing room at Keswick Manor, catching the gilt along the mirror and the pale blue silk upon the walls, but none of it softened the wicked delight of the pages in her hands. The paper crackled faintly as she adjusted it, her mouth already curving with disbelief.
Sophia, curled at the opposite end of the settee with a book forgotten in her lap, leaned forward at once. “Worse than Lady Danbury and the Italian violinist?”
“Much worse,” Frances nodded.
Their mother, Teresa Norton, the Viscountess of Keswick, was seated upright near the fire with her embroidery frame balancedbefore her. She gave a small sigh that was not truly disapproval, only ceremony.
“One should not sound so pleased by such things.”
Frances arched a brow. “Then I shall endeavor to sound solemn while reading them.”
“That would be a first,” her mother returned.
Sophia laughed softly, tucking a loose curl behind her ear. Of the three of them, she ought perhaps to have been the least interested in scandal, being shy by nature and easily flustered by real impropriety. Yet gossip, when safely confined to paper and drawing rooms, delighted her in the same way gothic novels did: it allowed her to shiver without consequence.
