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Her head reared back at his sarcasm. “No, I—”
He talked over her, the steam building. “Or simply knock on his door and demand the children back? I’m sure he’ll bow, apologize, and meekly hand them over. He can’t have wanted them much if he traveled all the way to Scotland to take them back.”
“You don’t understand. I—”
He stood to place his own balled fists on the desk and lean toward her. “What don’t I understand? That you whored yourself out? That, judging by the ages of your children, you sold your services for years? That you gave birth to those two sweet babes and made them bastards the same moment they drew their first breath? That Lister is their sire and therefore has every right under the laws of God and man to take them and hold them for as long as he bloody well pleases? Tell me, madam, what exactly do I not understand?”
“You’re being hypocritical!”
He stared at her. “What?”
“You’ve lain with me—”
“Don’t!” He leaned close to her, enraged almost beyond bearing. “Don’t compare what was between us to your life with Lister. I never paid you for your body. I didn’t sire bastards on you.”
She looked away.
He straightened, trying to control himself. “Dammit, Helen. What were you thinking to have not one, but two children with him? You’ve tainted their lives. It’s not so bad for Jamie, but Abigail… any man interested in her will know she is a bastard. It affects who and how she can marry. Was Lister’s money worth blighting your children’s future?”
“Don’t you think I know what I’ve done?” she whispered. “Why do you think I left him?”
“I don’t know.” He shook his head and stared at the ceiling. “Does it matter?”
“Yes.” She took a deep breath. “He doesn’t love them. He’s never loved them.”
He stared at her a moment, his mouth twisted, and then thrust himself away from the table with a barked laugh. “And you think that matters how? Will you go to a magistrate and plead that your love is truer than his? May I remind you, madam, that you whored yourself to him. Who do you think any right-minded person would side with—a duke of the realm or a common whore?”
“I’m not a whore,” she whispered in a trembling voice. “I never was a common whore. Lister kept me, yes, but it wasn’t what you think.”
A part of him ached at the pain he was inflicting on her, but he couldn’t seem to stop. And besides, another part of him wanted to inflict the pain. How could she have done this to her children?
He leaned a hip against a table and crossed his arms, cocking his head again. “Then explain to me how you were his mistress but not a whore.”
She clasped her hands like a little girl giving a recitation. “I was young—very young—when I met Lister.”
“What age?” he snapped.
“Seventeen.”
That gave him pause. Seventeen was still a child. His mouth tightened a bit before he jerked his chin at her. “Go on.”
“My father is a physician, a rather respected one, actually. We lived in Greenwich, in a house with a garden. When I was young, I would sometimes go with him on his visits.”
He eyed her. What she described was a lower class than he had imagined her to be. Her father worked as a physician, true, but he still earned his living. She wasn’t even gentry. She was leagues beneath a duke in social standing. “You lived with just your father?”
“No.” Her eyes dropped. “I have three sisters and a brother. And my… my mother. I was the second eldest girl.”
He jerked a nod for her to continue.
She was squeezing her hands together so tightly, he could see her nails digging into her skin. “One of my father’s patients was the dowager Duchess of Lister. She lived with the duke at that time. She was an elderly lady with many ailments, and Papa saw her every week, sometimes several times a week. I often accompanied him to the residence, and one day I met Lister.”
She closed her eyes and bit her lip. The room was quiet; this time Alistair made no move to interrupt.
Finally, she opened her eyes and smiled crookedly, sweetly. “The Duke of Lister is a tall man—Tom was right. Tall and imposing. He looks like a duke. I was waiting in a small sitting room for Papa to finish the visit, and he entered the room. I think he was looking for something—a paper, perhaps, though I can’t remember now. He didn’t notice me at first, and I was frozen in awe. The dowager duchess was an intimidating old lady, but this was her son, the duke. He looked over at me finally, and I rose and curtsied. I was so nervous I thought I’d trip over my own feet. But I didn’t.”
She frowned down at her hands. “Perhaps it would’ve been better if I had tripped.”
He asked quietly, “What happened?”
