The Defiant Wife (The Three Mrs #2) - Jess Michaels Page 0,27

I’ll join you.” Kenley reached for Rhys as she took him. “Unless you’d like to…to join us? See his afternoon routine?”

Rhys hesitated, but then he nodded. “I would like that. Lead the way.”

Rhys wasn’t certain what had caused the shift in Phillipa, but he felt it all the way down to his bones. She had been looking at him in the parlor and then something had changed in her. A transformation in the way she stood, in the spark in her eyes. If only he could read that wonderful mind of hers.

But he couldn’t. And he shouldn’t. It wasn’t his place, they’d very much established that.

Now she bent over Kenley as he lay on a little table in his nursery, changing him as she spoke softly, calming the baby with her voice and her touch. She lifted him from the table and held him to her shoulder as she began to walk to the room. She glanced at Rhys sometimes, but then away.

Kenley’s eyelids drooped, he rested heavier in her arms. She laid him in the cradle, tucking his blankets around him, placing a stuffed rabbit toy against the crook of his arm. She leaned down and kissed him.

Before they left the room, she turned down the lamps and took one last glance at the child. Rhys felt her love for the boy in every single part of her. And he wondered at it, just as she had when she told the story of how she’d come to discover he was her husband’s bastard son.

That she could so deeply love someone that could only be a reminder of pain was a testament to her character, to her heart. She loved with depth and loyalty. He envied anyone who received that gift from her.

As they walked down the hallway together, he cleared his throat. “You are very good with him.”

She shrugged. “It is easy to be. He has a happy spirit and is a very loving child.” She laughed. “He does have his moments, though.”

Rhys glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “I do not know much about children, I fear. But I believe what I just saw you do is often the duty of a nursemaid.”

She slowed her steps and he saw that the question troubled her. “I…suppose in many houses, especially those with money and means, that is true. I’ve known of mothers of rank who sent their children off to wet nurses and didn’t see them again until they were fully weaned at two or even older. But I would not wish such a thing.” She followed him down the stairs before she added, “We live a small life here, Rhys. And I like caring for him.”

“He is like your child,” he said.

She bent her head, and for a moment he saw the streak of pain that had accompanied this very subject a few days before. “Only he is not.”

He nodded. “One of the very topics I would like to discuss.” He motioned to the study, which they had reached at last. “Please.”

She entered the room before him and crossed to the chairs before the fire. As she sat, she declined tea or something stronger and just stared at him. She looked…petrified. Her hands gripped against the chair arms and her skin was suddenly pale.

“Phillipa,” he said as he crossed to her. He sat in the chair beside hers and caught her hands. “What is it?”

“You are going to take him away, aren’t you?” she gasped out.

His mouth dropped open and he stared at her in utter horror. “No,” he said. Tears filled her eyes, and he continued swiftly. “I do not know what I have done to make you think of me so cruelly, but I would never take that child from you.”

She bent her head, her breath coming in great heaves. “Oh, thank God. You were so private about whatever you were doing and then you were talking about nurses for Kenley. I thought…well, you know what I thought.”

“This is not a burden you should have to shoulder,” he said softly. “And if you did not wish to be a part of that boy’s life, it would be understandable. But I would never take him from you. Never. I can see how much you mean to each other.”

“Of course,” she said, and her fingers brushed against his as she took her hands away. “You have never proven yourself to be so cold. But with no information, I can run wild with potential futures, some