“I’dappreciatean attempt at the truth.” Nicholas leaned forward. “That will not save you entirely—you hurt my wife, and for that, you’ll be fortunate not to be leaving this cellar in a bag—butit might stay my hand a little. Silence is your enemy; lies are more so. I want the truth, Sherborne. What did you think you would gain from this?”
“Mydaughter,” he spat with a curled lip.
“Mm.” Nicholas looked the other man over, taking in the stubborn tilt of his jaw and the defiant spark in his eye. “But you have no proof that she is yours.”
“Grace told me she was!”
“Not good enough. We both know Grace was a liar. She lied to me, and it is entirely plausible she lied to you.”
Nicholas bent over the chair and closed a hand around Sherborne’s collar. “But there is another layer to this deception, because I donotbelieve Grace would have told you that Sophia was your daughter. She was far too proud for that. Whatever the truth, she would have wanted her child known as the daughter of a duke. She would neverwillinglyhave diminished Sophia’s place in the world—she loved her too much.” The words no longer caused him pain. “If you decided the girl was yours, you found your proof somewhere other than Grace.”
“What more proof do you want?” Sherborne hissed furiously. “She came to me first when you denied her a chance to move to warmer climes! She wanted London, but failing that, she would have taken Spain or Italy. Something hot, somewhere she could have a new start. You knew she was miserable in Yorkshire, and you did nothing! She said she would run away with me. Just the two of us.”
Nicholas went still.
He remembered the quarrels. Grace had despised the isolation of his estate and resented every obligation that bound him toit. More than once she had demanded that they leave Yorkshire altogether. He had offered months in London during the social season, even half the year in Italy, but compromise had never interested her. She wanted departure without return...
Ultimately, he had refused. A duke could not abandon his seat because his wife disliked the climate. More importantly, a father did not surrender the raising of his child.
Hischild.
The thought came quietly, carrying with it the first hint of certainty.
Those arguments had begun years after Sophia’s birth. The first true rupture—the day Grace had packed trunks and tried to leave—had occurred when Sophia was three, old enough to travel without difficulty.
And Grace had intended to take her.
For all her vanities and cruelties, Grace had loved Sophia. She might have abandoned Nicholas, but she would never have gone willingly without her daughter. Nor would she have ruined Sophia’s future by openly deserting her marriage. Nicholas had understood that, even then. It was why he had never used force to stop her.
It was why she had always returned.
And if that was what Sherborne claimed, then he didn’t know her as well as he believed. Or perhaps he, too, was seduced by her sweet lies, because he wanted them to be the truth enough.
Either way, his certainty about Sophia had been built upon a lie.
Nicholas released Sherborne’s collar and straightened. The hard knot between his shoulders loosened.
Grace must have told the man that she had begged for years to take them all abroad, never guessing the embellishment would expose her. The affair had begun near the end of their marriage, exactly when Nicholas had suspected—not before Sophia’s birth.
Sophia was his.
She had always been his in every way that mattered. But now, at last, he knew the blood in her veins was his as well.
“Tell me why you came to me and tried to steal my daughter,” he growled. “We both know it’s not true, so why? What did you have to gain? You neverwantedSophia.” As soon as he said the words, he felt the truth of them. This had never been about Sophia, had it? If it was, he would have kicked up this fuss five years ago after Grace’s death—he wouldn’t have waited so long.
Sherborne’s mouth twisted and he spat in Nicholas’s direction, apparently abandoning the belief that Sophia could be his as swiftly as he’d picked it up. “Because I loved Grace, and you killed her!”
That first letter Nicholas had received on his wedding night flashed in his mind. A vindictive letter accusing him of murder—of all things.
“Ah. So now it becomes clear.” Nicholas sat back in his chair, surveying the other man. All the guilt he had been fighting for these years felt suddenly pointless. Isadora was right: Grace had made her choices. She was a grown woman; he could not be held responsible for her actions.
After all, he had fought with her—butshehad fought withhim, too. And now he couldn’t even remember who had begun the fight that had ended with her storming out. It had been one of their worst, and he was most certainly not free of blame—but he could not be held responsible for the ensuing carriage accident after the event.
“So this was about revenge…” Nicholas murmured. “You wanted to hurt me by taking away someone I loved.”
Sherborne strained against his restraints, face red to bursting. “You only loved Grace when it suited you!”
“I loved herallof the time,” Nicholas said evenly. “And she loved me too… when it was convenient for her to do so.” Although she made plenty of mistakes, he knew she had loved him at least once. “We were not happy together, but that is as much her fault as my own. AndIdid not seek solace elsewhere.”
