Lover Be Mine A Legendary Lovers Novel - By Nicole Jordan Page 0,42

things in Jack’s past that have affected him profoundly.” Pressing her lips shut, she grimaced. “Ordinarily I would never dream of betraying his confidences. This is a discussion you should be having directly with Jack. But I know he will never volunteer his history himself, and you need to know what happened in order to understand him.”

At this drawn-out rationalization, Sophie felt her brow furrow.

Skye must have recognized how cryptic her comments sounded, for she gave a pained smile. “Forgive me, I am not usually so mealymouthed. It is just that I care deeply for my cousin and I can’t bear to see him hurt. If I tell you, can I trust you not to use the knowledge against him?”

By now Sophie was highly puzzled. “I cannot imagine wanting to hurt him.”

“No, you are known for your kindness.” Skye nodded as if coming to a decision. “Very well, then. As I said, it will help if you understand Jack. You need to realize he will go slowly in any courtship. He is not likely to risk his heart easily. Not after the trauma he endured as a child.”

“Trauma?”

“You know that Jack was the love child of my aunt, Lady Clara Wilde?”

“Yes.”

“Well, he was only six when he watched his mother be killed by a Paris mob during their bloody Revolution. He spent that night holding her body, until a corpse wagon finally came and took her away.”

Shock filled Sophie at the gruesome revelation. Her brush faltered as she met Skye’s somber gaze in the mirror. “How terrible.”

“Indeed it was, but his story gets even worse. Jack lost his direction trying to find his way home to their lodgings, and when he at last managed it, all the servants had fled, English and French alike. By then Jack’s father had returned to his own country—a principality bordering France—since the Revolution was growing more dangerous by the day. So young Jack had no one to turn to. For nearly a week, he lived on the streets, scavenging for food and trying to fend for himself, until a tavern-keeper finally took him in.”

“Thank heaven,” Sophie murmured hoarsely.

“Actually it was quite the opposite,” Skye replied, her tone grim. “The tavern-keeper’s scheme was to get rich. He knew Jack had wealthy English relatives, and if he couldn’t be ransomed, then he could be sold. Jack was a handsome child and would have brought a high price in the flesh trade. So he was locked in a garret and half-starved for months as punishment for attempting to escape.”

“Oh, my God.” Sophie turned fully in her seat to stare at Skye. “He was only six years old?” she breathed in horror. “I cannot even imagine.…” And yet sadly she could. The image brought an ache to her throat … a young child, grieving for his dead mother, alone and terrified, being held prisoner for ransom or worse.

“Indeed,” Skye agreed quietly. “You won’t hear about his ordeal from Jack, for he never, ever speaks of it. Our family only pieced together his story small fragments at a time.”

“How did he survive?”

Skye answered in a low voice. “It was many weeks before news of my Aunt Clara’s death got back to our family in England. One of her English friends wrote to notify us of her passing and of her young son’s disappearance. Of course my father and my Uncle Stephen—Lord Beaufort—immediately went to Paris to find Jack. They searched everywhere frantically, but by then he had been missing for nearly two months. The Parisians were very little help. At that time, British citizens could still move freely about France, but they were intensely disliked, especially noblemen like my father and uncle. Another fortnight passed before finally—miraculously—they found Jack and rescued him from the tavern-keeper. A sympathetic serving girl had risked her position to tip them off.”

“Thank God. They brought him home to England?”

“Yes. I wasn’t even born at the time, but when I was old enough to understand, Quinn and Ash told me about meeting Jack for the first time. Sophie, it was heartbreaking. When Jack arrived at Beauvoir, he was pitifully thin and practically mute, shying away from even a gentle touch, clinging to the little dormouse he had befriended. That mouse was his only consolation during those horrible months of captivity, my father said. Jack kept it safe in his pocket and would never let it out of his sight. Then his pet died when I was a baby, and I became his substitute. Jack made