The Problem with Seduction - By Emma Locke Page 0,24

sorry.

“I know you’re lying,” he said through gritted teeth.

Con shrugged. “It’s a matter of simple math, as I said to begin with. Were you with her?”

When Nicholas didn’t reply, Con asked it again. “Were you with her nine months—even ten months before she was, uh, confined?”

Nicholas continued to look at Con with stony disapproval. Elizabeth felt the last of her love for him disappear. What could he say? The truth? That there had been so much between them a year ago, but now he couldn’t even remember when last they’d taken a turn between the sheets?

“No answer?” Lord Constantine taunted. “Drat it all, but my mother explained this to me just the other day. I’m certain your participation was required.”

Elizabeth held her breath. If he remembered that last night together… Their passionate argument over his most recent dalliance, followed by even more passionate lovemaking, followed by the birth of their child... But he didn’t.

Nicholas gritted his teeth, then, with one last, longing look for Oliver, he loped toward the door Con obstructed.

Mrs. Dalton regarded Con with adoration. The innkeeper and his wife began to fidget, perhaps realizing the show was about to come to an end. Elizabeth’s relief almost made her dizzy and yet, she couldn’t get Nicholas’s stricken look out of her head. Was he here because Oliver was his property and he commanded what he owned, or because he cherished his son? Was his determination to have Oliver hardly different than his treatment of his wife, who must endure his philandering because he was her husband and therefore her master, or because he couldn’t bear to be separated from his only child?

Nicholas stopped just short of Lord Constantine blocking the exit. “She’s using you, Alexander. I’d pity you, if I were a man to waste time on fools.”

Con stepped to the side as if he meant to allow the other man to pass. At the last minute, his arm shot out to bar the doorway. It caught Nicholas hard across the chest. “Don’t follow my mistress again, Captain. Indolence has its benefits.” He looked sideways at the officer. “I have plenty of time to waste on fools.”

Con had known something wasn’t right when he’d left her townhouse several mornings ago. It was something in her eyes as she’d looked at him before she’d darted upstairs to see to her babe. Sadness, he’d thought then. Maybe a touch of anger. Since he’d just said some beastly things to her, he’d assumed he’d been the cause of it.

Now he suspected there was more going on. Finn had been following her. Constantine could only guess how long. He was an ancillary party to all of this, and really, he shouldn’t be here now. If he’d kept on past the door instead of stopping to assist, he might even have remained uninvolved. Hell, if he’d stayed home instead of riding out here, he wouldn’t even know Finn was threatening her. Then he’d be pleasantly clueless, and she’d be frightened out of her mind.

He was glad now that he’d gone back to her townhouse a day later to apologize for the unconscionable ass he’d been to her. The house had been all but vacant, which he hadn’t expected. With a few questions, he’d learned the small number of servants remaining stayed on with the lease, while she’d taken her personal servants to Shropshire. It was then that he’d become suspicious. That suspicion had turned embarrassingly selfish when he’d realized she’d taken his ability to make things right along with her, for if she wasn’t in London where he was, he couldn’t possibly perform due diligence as a father. Then what would he tell his family?

He’d decided on the return walk to Merritt House that he must fetch her back. If it was his fault she’d left, if he’d offended her somehow with his proposal, he had to make things right. And if it wasn’t, well, he couldn’t have her stealing away in the middle of the night, or whenever it was she’d left, without leaving him a forwarding direction. He had a duty to her son.

And so it was the baby he’d ultimately gone after, not the mother, although the woman standing before him now turned him inside out as she raised those lovely hazel eyes to his. Her inner strength appealed to him in a way he hadn’t suspected would attract him.

“Thank you.” Her voice trembled, exposing a tiny swath of vulnerability he immediately wanted to shield. “I fear what might have