The Defiant Wife (The Three Mrs #2) - Jess Michaels Page 0,1

she would never get used to the way Leighton said Phillipa. It rolled over his tongue almost like a caress and made her stomach flip in ways that it most definitely should not.

“I’m fine,” she gasped out with a forced smile. “I was just coming to assure the groom that the bride is almost ready for him.”

He inclined his head. “And I was sent by said groom to check on the bride.”

Her smile became more genuine. “Mr. Gregory is anxious then.”

“Very.” A flutter of a smile crossed his lips and she swallowed at the sight of it. The man was truly handsome and she had no right to dwell on it so much. For too many reasons.

He cleared his throat. “Actually, I’m glad to have caught you alone. There is something we need to discuss.”

Her heart rate ratcheted up a notch and she fought to keep that reaction from her face as she motioned him back up the hall toward the stairs. At least if they were walking side by side, he couldn’t look at her so intently. “What is it?”

He paused, like this conversation was uncomfortable. “My brother’s son.”

Now she stumbled and he reached out to catch her elbow. The briefest of touches, gone the moment she was steady, but she felt it ricochet through her body just like his words did.

The son was not her child, though she had raised him since his mother disappeared. Pippa’s former servant, a woman who had turned out to be a long-time lover of Erasmus Montgomery. His true love. They’d had a child, one Erasmus saw as a bargaining chip and who Rosie, the mother, truly loved even if she had made a series of terrible decisions that separated them.

But now Erasmus was dead. Struck down by Rosie, herself, who had promptly run away.

“Kenley,” she breathed, trying not to think too hard about those chubby cheeks she adored. She had not seen the boy in weeks, though she regularly heard from the servants who had taken over his care.

Rhys flinched. “He named him…Kenley?” he asked, his voice cracking in a way that revealed emotion he didn’t show on his angled face.

“Yes.”

He shook his head. “That was our father’s given name. Taken from our grandmother’s maiden name.”

“I…I didn’t know. Turns out I didn’t know much. But I am sorry for the grief all this has caused.”

“I know you are, even if you needn’t be.”

She lifted her gaze and he held it for a moment. Everything else in the hallway melted away then. All that was left was him as he held her attention, as he made her forget that anything else in the world existed.

She blinked and fought to maintain whatever little dignity she had left. “I appreciate your kindness more than you could know, my lord. When it comes to the child, though, I could make arrangements to return to Bath. Everything will be topsy-turvy because of the wedding, but I’m certain I could be ready the day after tomorrow and be home before the week is out. I could prepare a full report on the boy, and we could find some kind of schedule that would suit you as to his health and well-being.”

She expected him to agree and for that to be the end of it. She didn’t exactly look forward to a return, but she had always known it was going to happen. She had responsibilities there, of course. She couldn’t live in the fantasy land of London forever.

But to her surprise, he shook his head. “No.”

Her brow wrinkled. “N-No?” she repeated.

“I need to assess the situation for myself.”

She stared at him. “But you…you have so much to attend to here. I know your world has been turned upside down, Rhys…” She shook her head. “Lord Leighton. You cannot possibly spare the time for this.”

“He is a child,” he said, his gaze holding hers again. “His life and future are the most important matters I have to attend to. I could not focus on the more frivolous resolutions knowing that I had not dealt with this first.”

Her lips parted at the passion with which he spoke about a baby he had never even met. Never known the existence of until just two weeks before. “You are truly a decent man.”

His jaw tightened and those bright blue eyes flickered over her again. “Not very decent, I assure you.” He straightened his perfectly placed jacket with what looked like discomfort and then began to move down the hallway again, forcing her